Ingenue, Interrupted

There's only so much mental health to go around.....

2009-09-03T10:36:00.002-04:00

You know, someone was just telling me about this theory over dinner a few days ago. I was ranting and raving about quitting smoking, quitting sugar, upping my work hours, switching out my workout regime, and giving myself a head to toe makeover SIMULTANEOUSLY when my friend Mark mentioned it.

"Yeah, they like, did a study where people were offered a plate of cookies and a plate of radishes. One group were allowed to eat the cookies and the other group was told to abstain from the cookies and only eat the radishes. 15 minutes later they were given algebra tests and the group who had to deny themselves the cookies did 30% more poorly than the cookie monsters."

And this proves?

"Well, you know, each of us only has so much willpower, discipline, and perservance to go around. You want to make dietary changes fine, but work might suffer. You want to quit smoking go for it, but your diet might spin out. And if you want to completely GUT every bad habit you have at the same time you might as well forget being able to show up for your life at all. Like, ever. "

Anecodotal evidence collected from my own life proves conclusively that this is in fact the case. Although it is getting far easier to live happy, joyous, and free w/o being constantly tripped up by my character flaws the desire to completely renovate myself every 30 days is one that comes with some serious strings attached to it. That's a fair amount of upheaval to be putting myself through. Takes alot of energy away from the business of living to be constantly re-inventing. You basically can't do anything else but isolate yourself in the metaphorical cocoon you've built until the day you decide YOU'RE SO TOTALLY READY to show the world your beautiful new butterfly wings.

Except that day never really comes. There's always a reason to put it off and put it off and put it off. There's always little tweaks here and there that have to be made. Another five pounds to lose, another 50 points added to my credit score- then I'll be ready. These days, I'm always asking myself, what am I getting ready for? What existential night out on the town is all this spiritual primping for?

And a bratty little voice in the back of my head says, "There has to be something else. This can't be all there is for you."

Ultimately, this is why every major habit breaking I've ever undergone was undertaken. Or...errrr......something like that. I quit sugar because I'm convinced that my anger will abate when I'm not suffering from sugar highs and lows. I quit smoking because I'm convinved that my restless irritable discontent nature will be less noticeable when I'm not suffering from constant nic-fits. I hit the gym because I am CERTAIN my self esteem will soar once my body is bulletproof.

And to a certain extent, all of these things are true. But I just pulled out of a majorly narcisstic phase where nothing was more sacred that then the temple of the body, and while I look amazing on the outside, my inner life has been fairly tumultuous ever since. And if I take the time to start sorting out my life's deeper issues, my aerodynamic abs will start to liquify. Sigh.

And as of this morning, I'm ok with that. Because I'm starting to get it. Having a life in balance means exactly that, balancing between states of living. Presence cannot be replaced with presents and no one gets out alive.

Babble forth boldy my beauties-

Ing

Wowwwww.....creepy

2009-08-26T10:09:00.000-04:00

GEMINI
[May 21–June 20]

Adam and Eve were banished from the Garden of Eden because of an incident involving an apple, right? Wrong. Many Biblical scholars suspect the fruit in question was either a fig, grape, or pomegranate. I mention this, Gemini, because I think you'd be wise to review your own personal myth of exile. It's time to question the story you have been telling yourself about how your paradise got lost. Evidence you discover in the coming days just might suggest that everything you've believed is at least half-wrong—that your origins are different from what you imagine. And as for the forbidden fruit that supposedly led you astray: You may realize that it was actually a precious medicine.

Why I love Invite Health

2009-08-06T15:24:00.002-04:00

Listen, I have to have my vitamins. I cannot live without them, and I fear my reliance on them is far more psychogical than physical. It makes me feel infinitely better to know that my delicate cells are being flushed with high grade omegas and fortified with all manners of aminos. I. Have. To. Supplement. It pleases me. And not for nothing, I've gotten through some of my more harrowing physical moments (detox, post-partum depression, liver cleansing) with the help of pharmaceutical grade nutrients.

So, much like an addict with a heroin habit to support, it is crucial that I maintain a relationship with a supplier (dealer). Invite Health has the hookup as far as I'm concerned.

I almost (but not quite) feel a little guilty forging the comparison with drug addiction and vitamin popping. Invite is trying to do something good for mankind, and they should be commended for it. Nowhere near enough money is spent researching naturopathic rememdies to serious ailments. Invite has a thoughtful, deliberate approach to supplementation. They have supplemental solutions for a host of ailments that tend to baffle traditional medicine. They have licensed nutritionists working at the stores and if you ask for a nutritional consultation, you will get a nutritional consultation!

Such was the case with me, when I sprinted in Invite this morning between meetings. I had been out of Sam-e for four days (remember when I discovered Sam-E) and was rewarded with a mild depressive episode last night for my troubles. My moods have been a bit more erratic of late, because I've totally surrendered to my sugar addiction and we all know what happens when I do that. I've been trying, desperately trying, to kick the white stuff, but the harder I try the worse it gets. So I thought I'd throw that out to the Invite Universe while shopping for my regulars.

"Excuse me? Does this Carb HX support you nutritionally while you transition to a low carb diet or is it a carb-blocker?"

"It's a carb-blocker."

"Ahh, I see. Ok. Hmmmm. Do you have anything that helps you transition to a low carb diet?"

He looked at me knowingly and while never once breaking eye contact asked me, "Is it the Sugar Cravings?"

JESUS H!!!! How does he know?!?!?!?

All kidding aside, I dove right in and told him everything. I mean, all of it. The Quitting Drinking, The Quitting Smoking, the Dietary Obsessions, The Over Exercising, The Depression, the whole damn shebang.

I told him my goal was to cut out all simple sugars and non-complex carbohydrates for the next 30 days and he prescribed a nutritional attack to combat: blues, sugar cravings, lowered energy levels, and blood sugar swings.

For the next month I am taking:
Sam-E (Always, it's a miracle amino)
5-HTP
Fish Oil (Mega, mega fish oils which make the inside of my nose smell like tuna, but whatevs)
GlucoHx (Chromium, Alpha Lipoic Acid, Vanadium, Gymnema, Bitter Melon, and Fenugreek)

It'll take some time before I see whether or not this is working, but so far so good. It is now 4:10 and historically, this is exactly the time when I would be succumbing to my pre-dinner crash and stuffing my face with peanut m&m's to try and boost up my flagging energy levels. I'm fine. I'm not salivating and suffering with mental fantasties of a chocolate bender, I'm quite alright.

So we'll see. I'll keep you updated. I know I'm always maniacally googling any new vitamin I think will correct my woes, so all anecdotal information is good. Having said that, I am not a damn doctor, so please don't think I'm offering medical advice. Especially if you're on depression meds. Heartbreaking and tragic things happen when people stop taking mind meds w/o medical supervision. Don't even think about it.

But I digress, if all goes according to plan (hahahaha * snicker * lol. I plan, God laughs) by the end of this month I should be sugar free and living the sweet life! I've been round this bend enough times to know, that if I can make it through the first 30 days, I'm golden. My blood sugar stabilizes after that, cravings turn towards healthy stuff, and my abs come out of hiding. But if I fold in the first 30 days, only God knows when I'll be able to get another sugar free day again. It's that freaking bad folks. I literally have to count days off The White Devil. I cannot have so much as a teaspoon without throwing myself headfirst into the sugar cyclone.

Go to Invite! Get hooked up! Check them out and stay tuned for further developments....

xoxoxo
Ingenue

Holy Service Batman!

2009-06-23T10:46:00.000-04:00

My life is all alcoholics all the time these days. I don’t know where it came from, it’s certainly wasn’t my intention, but here we are. I learned how to work the program, the program worked me over, and now I have something to offer the sick and tired who are sick and tired of being SICK AND TIRED.

Those who can must, peeps. It’s a fundamental truth of our way of life, my primary purpose is and will forever more be to help another alcoholic. That’s it. Anything else I add in there re: diet, boys, outfits, occupations, and hair color is really just my will manifesting itself in the only way it knows how. It still comes right back around to; what did you do for the other guy today? Who did you help? Did you sacrifice your own creature comforts for the well-being of the next woman?

I’ve always wanted to be of service to my fellow alcoholics. I’m moved deeply whenever I hear someone announce their day count. I love Newcomer women! But for the longest I was balls out terrified to open my mouth around them, because I thought I would scare them right off. When I was still counting days, I was relatively happy. I stopped drinking and my life got immeasurably better in those first months. But from four months until very recently, I failed to enlarge my spiritual condition and my untreated alcoholism ran circles around my attempts to control my disease.

I was a surly, screaming bitch from month 4 to 14 and I had no idea why.

I tried to do some step-work, but it really didn’t have any affect because I wasn’t completely surrendered. I thought I was, but thinking can be incredibly misleading when it comes to the nature of alcoholism.

Long story short, I was given the gift of desperation AGAIN, I started my steps in earnest, and I really went after my recovery with everything I had in me. And I got better! I got glowy and happy, social and bubbly. The more I stepped, the more people started responding favorably to me and before I knew it I had new-comer girls asking how I’d stayed sober for almost two years.

I was baffled when this first happened. I’m so used to thinking of myself as a miserable excuse for sobriety that seeing some gorgeous little drunk come up to me with admiration in her eyes, was more than I could handle. I freaked out, said something weird and abrupt, and ran away. Progress not perfection, right?

I wasn’t settled into the changes that I had undergone. I didn’t trust that I could interact normally with people now that I had my spiritual experience. I was still defensive and locked up, waiting for hostile comebacks to come vomiting out of my mouth. Or for the volume of my voice to raise uncontrollably, and for people to starts slowly backing away from me. I’ve had 29 years of seeing people shy away from me, it’s normal and natural that I would still be expecting these things. But it’s no longer necessary, and slowly I started sticking around to answer the newcomer questions that were leveled at me.

And my answers are always the same.

“Ohmygod, you HAVE to do your steps. It’s like Magic….you have to try this shit!”

“Did you start your steps, yet? That’s fantastic, I’m so excited for you! You should call me, I want to hear all about it.”

And I mean every word of it. Every word of it is what was given to me when my sponsor read the Big Book with me. That’s what saved my life. Shit, that’s what gave me a life worth living! Steps, steps, and more steps. Service, service, and more service. These two things bring me incalculable amounts of joy, and I can’t stop shouting it from the rooftops.

So now, Alcoholics are popping up EVERYWHERE. There’s two in my office that are in constant need of support. One of them suffered my foolishness when I was first getting sober, and now he’s newly sober so I can repay the kindness.

God, you work in such mysterious freaking ways. I totally respect your Gangsta.

Ingenue

P.S. Stepwork brings the sexy back.

Dr. Jekkyl and Ms. Hyde? Your table for two is waiting...

2009-06-23T10:06:00.000-04:00

It’s so funny to be getting a look at the Jekyl and Hyde nature of Alcoholic Ingenue and Recovered Ingenue.

Untreated Alcoholic Ingenue:
Walks a mile a minute with her shoulders squared and her jaw set. Shouts when she means to whisper, fumes and blames EVERYTHING on EVERYONE. She’s usually wearing way too much eye makeup (her favorite avoidance therapy is fixing up the externals when the internals are gnarly) and two pushup bras (because one is never enough when you’re sick and suffering) to try and fake cleavage that God did not intend to be there. She flirts with married men and then gets outraged when they say inappropriate things to her. She spends her entire work day trying too look busy and important at the expense of actually doing her job. Don’t even think about asking how her day went, she’ll tell you all about it. And it ain’t ever pretty.

Recovered Ingenue:

Still wakes up feeling a mild case of the Fuck Its, but drops to her knees first thing and gets in conscious contact with her creator. After that she bounds around like a golden retriever, just happy to be up and about and moving. Hair and makeup are whatever she has time for, she prefers to spend her “getting ready” time on spiritual and physical fitness. No matter. Whatever she looks like on the outside, she feels totally gorgeous so she’s free to wear whatever the fuck she pleases, male attention be damned.

Work is spent in service to the world at large. When she has a question she asks it humbly, even if it makes her look unknowledgeable. She works through problems as they arise, instead of putting them off for another day. She answers phone calls and emails. She takes responsibility for her mistakes and works arduously at correcting them.

She DOES NOT BLAME THE QUALITY OF HER LIFE ON ANYONE ELSE.

She sounds like a bit of a surfer girl when she speaks, and she doesn’t care what anyone thinks about that because authenticity is fucking priceless, dude.

She smiles and hugs, listens, and laughs.

With all of this evidence, you would think I’d have absolutely no reservations about strenuously working my program and chasing after my steps. And yet.

Every now and then we all need a refill on the willingness. I can’t ever forget what I become when I fail to enlarge and maintain my spiritual condition.

xoxoxo,
Ingenue

God help me.

2009-06-19T09:44:00.003-04:00

Damn, dude. It happened again. I vacated my blogging for no good reason and here I come, crawling back in abject humility.

Yeesh, that's a bit dark isn't it? I didn't mean it to be, but it stays. Maybe that's my true inner state right now. Maybe that's what I'm trying to supress. Maybe I'm trying to hide from the fact that even though I've been step-working like my ass is on fire, my life still seems a bit.....awful. Don't get me wrong, it has it's moments! All in all though, I have to say I am not impressed.

And this is my own doing, really. I am back living with roommates, AGAIN, and again all hell is breaking loose. It's nowhere near as vicious this time, and it's not affecting me as deeply, but it is affecting me. I react, I pre-act, I fix, I solve, I pray, and everytime I think I've come to the bottom of this shit, it comes back.

Having said that, I am deeply, deeply responsible for the hurt feeling of my roommates. This time, there is no doubt in my head that I am the problem. I left the apartment for months in a state of mild disaster, I'm construction style confrontational whenever they try and approach me about it, and lately I've been pulling off this Mean Girls style sneer whenever they come within a five foot radius of me.

I'm in fullbown attack mode and I cannot make it stop.

My adversaries? A 60 year old buddhist nun and a 5 foot 2 codepenent trainer who flinches whenever someone sneezes too loud.

What the hell is the matter with me? Honestly, the buddhist nun is a bit of a nightmare, but I know why or how she's stirring up this level of character defectiveness. I cannot seem to extricate myself from the downward spiral where she pulls me aside in the morning to explain to me that I'm angry and confrontational and I respond by becoming angry and confrotational.

It's no good, the emotional hangovers are BRUTAL and I did not vacate my last hostile living situation to move into another one. Clearly, G.O.D has a lesson for me that I failed to learn the first time around, so we're going for it again.

G.O.D-

Please, for the love of all that is Holy and True, show me what it is you want me to learn in this situation so I can do the damn thing and get on with my life. And please, again for the love of all that is Holy and True, make it obvious.

Can I get a witness? Whoop whoop!
Ingenue

Birthday GRRL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2009-05-25T08:25:00.002-04:00

My birthday was actually this past Saturday, but I am now 3 to the 0. Is it just me or does that KICK ASS? I mean, really, 30 is a brand new decade. I'm sober, I'm fifth stepped, I'm blonde, I'm fearless. What's not to love here? But the real gifts of this birthday just keep piling up. It's not what I would have asked for, but clearly God has chosen to celebrate my arrival into my Dirty Thirties......

GD's Gifts to Me:

On Thursday my sponsor sat for 7 hours (WHEN THE WOMAN HAD MONO) to hear my fifth step. She helped me see things about myself that I've been batshit blind to for the last 29 years. Nothing's felt the same since, and I am truly ready to march into this wild world and right the wrongs, bring the funk and bring the noise. I feel like a warrior princess gone gorgeous, and 90% of that is in seeing where my defects are (and praying daily that they be removed from me, so I can fully serve this Universe).

On Friday, just after my spiritual experience, I got to qualify at one of my FAV women's meetings. Normally, qualifications for me are ego-driven Team Ingenue Extravaganzas. This one felt different from the jump. I was moved people. Can I get a witness?

On Saturday (otherwise known as THE BIG DAY) I did yoga, took about a million birthday phone calls, ate a red velvet cupcake given to my by my roomie, and laid out in the sun. After that came the DANCING because it wouldn't be a weekend, let alone a birthday, without dancing.

On Sunday the Universe said happy birthday to me with a New Moon in Gemini. A New Moon in your sign, ON YOUR DAMN BIRTHDAY, is a huuuuuuge deal. It doesn't happen very often. When it does, one must be prepared to harness that shit and take the ride. You say your New Moon wishes, you spiritually prepare yourself for change, and you step into the unknown.

A spiritual experience, a New Moon, a full dancecard, and the gift of being me! Happy Birthday, indeed.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Ingenue

I don't know how...I don't know why.....

2009-05-03T08:58:00.004-04:00

I feel amazing today. Like, really fantastic. I'm working seven days in a row, I haven't showered since Friday (it's Sunday morning), but I feel better than I have in a while. I feel cute (thanks to my favorite slouchy hat which covers up seriously grungy hair and brings the adorable all at the same time), my muscles are presently in love with me (thanks to Exercise TV) and I am happy. Fancy that!

Today is not the sort of day I would have planned out for myself. I'm technically on duty at the jobsite, but I have more freedom to wander and catch a meeting and drop off my laundry and all that happy horseshit. Yesterday I felt completely LOCKED DOWN and I had a really hard time accepting the fact that I was going to have a 13 hour workday, ON A FREAKING SATURDAY, when Times Square was just outside my door filled with happy, joyous, and free tourists who had NO FUCKING IDEA how much I was suffering mere feet away from their joviality.

This is where my head goes when I am in Active Resistance Mode. It doesn't matter what I'm resisting, form does not follow function in this case. It could be that my pedicure is taking too long. It could be a dinner where 10 people too many showed up, and I wanted it to be intimate and cozy. It could be a seventeen hour work day, or it could be a day off where nobody else wants to play.

Active Resistance Mode is simply me finding my body in one place, and my mind wishing it were somewhere else. I start daydreaming, and then I start mentally conniving, and then I start silently begging, and next comes the fuming. After a few hours of all of this inner dialogue I take it to the streets and start shouting at whoever I've decided Is. To. Blame. for the fact that I am being held somewhere against my will.

It's pretty fucking painful, I can tell you that much. It's an even more horrible headspace now that I rarely occupy it. I've had a taste of freedom and surrender and whenever I lock myself back up it's completely unbearable because I know all to well what's on the other side of the bars.....

Today, I surrendered to the Universe and the Universe surrendered itself to me. Off to enjoy my dirty hair and my sunlit spirit.

Construction Kisses,
Ingenue

Confessions of a Nutrition Junkie

2009-05-01T09:05:00.003-04:00

Email I wrote this morning to Heather Strang, Conscious Eating Diva Extroardinare

Subject: I love your mission!‏

From:
Ingenue
Sent:
Fri 5/01/09 9:02 AM
To:
heather@heatherstrang.com

I am so called to food issues, and alot of what I just read on your blog speaks to the many different nutritional callings I've had over the past few years. I have a VERY difficult time integrating all of the different paths I've taken foodwise into one thing that works for me.

Sugar and hypoglycemia are my main issues so I love the craving free life that low carb gives me. But I grow weary of eggs for breakfast every morning, and a life lived w/o watermelon and Green Smoothies, is no kind of life at all in my opinion.

I loved raw food (ate raw for almost two years) but suffered from daily hypoglycemia symptoms. It was weird, I felt nutrients coursing through me ALL THE TIME, but had wild ups and downs, mood swings and anxiety. I was doing a super high fruit deal at the time though, so there is that.

Organic vegan usually finds me getting down with way too much bread, and I miss lean protein sources, but ethically I feel way superior. :)

And typical S.A.D. just makes me feel depleted in the self esteem department, in every way, but it's so damn easy to slip into.

I feel like I keep getting called back to wheat-free, dairy-free, and definitely SUGAR-free (sugar turns me into a sociopath) as the foundation of a eating plan the works for me. I've been so impressionable for so long, that if anyone else lost 35 pounds with it, I wanted to do it, like yesterday. But these days I'm more concerned with finding out what my body wants, and your blog inspired me greatly to that end.

Cheers,
Ingenue

Things I Learned on Vacation

2009-04-30T15:11:00.000-04:00

It’s only mildly horrifying to me that I was actually AFRAID to take time off. Times is bleak, and my alcoholic mind had me soundly convinced that disappearing from my jobsite for more than 6 hours would result in my immediate replacement. It’s a typical workaholic trap, conning yourself into believing that your work-world will stop spinning in your absence and in your exhaustion holding out that you’re the most disposable employee to ever grace God’s Earth. It’s an easy and predictable way for my disease to rob me of any peace, and I was officially down for the count by the time I put my PTO request in.

Frankly, I would have totally called my bosses and screamed, “HAHAHA! I was just joshing about the vacation. I know how much you need me, I would never dream of leaving you. YOU DO NEED ME, RIGHT?” had I not been completely laid out by a moving vehicle the Monday before my departure. That sufficiently shook me up enough, to call Uncle, to surrender to my need to shut down and turn off.

So Thursday came and I scurried around my disaster of a bedroom trying to put together as many outfits as I could cram into my travel bag. That didn’t work, so I ran out and bought a SECOND travel bag, and stuffed that one full too. You can imagine my surprise when I arrived DC and discovered that I didn’t have a single thing to wear. Best laid plans, right?

I brought my LEED book with me to study on the train. I had a 4 hour ride ahead of me, and I was planning on sucking every last minute of it dry, for maximum productivity. Instead, I found myself aimlessly staring out the window watching trailer parks come and go in my line of vision. I tried to open the book, but it literally jumped right back out of my hands like it was electrically charged. So for the first time in many, many moons I did: Not a Damn Thing. I just sat there and let it be quiet. I sort of let the trauma of the last week wash over me, and through me, under me and everywhere. It wasn’t exactly comfortable, but I stayed quiet. Sometimes a girl just need to sit and navel gaze, and when that time comes, nothing else will do.

Lizzie was waiting for me at the train station and although DC was every bit as busy as NYC, it was noticeably happier. I found this profoundly disturbing. Of course I had gone on vacation to enjoy myself, but I was not convinced that I could shuck off my surliness with so little preparation. I immediately lit a cigarette, fixed a fakish smile to my face, and bravely set foot into my vacay.

The first night was a little rocky, because I was still totally confrontational NYC style. A random homeless dude started serenading us and I completely lost my shit.

“Will you just FUCK OFF already? Jesus H! What are you, high? Nobody wants your busted compliments, bro. Fuck off, fuck off, FUCK OFF!”

Lizzie stared at me aghast, but quickly recovered herself like the true lady she is. Telling loudmouthed assholes to fuck off had been my favorite pastime when I left the city, but it didn’t jive so well against the backdrop of Dupont Circle. And yet, I was relaxing despite myself, and this became crystal clear when we sat down to dinner.

It was like I had never eaten a decent meal before in my life, it was fucking mouthwatering, it was…..Chilean Seabass. Miso and Mirin Marinated Chilean Seabass. Why didn’t anybody tell me about Chilean Seabass before? How long has this shit been around? Am I the last to know everything?

I was so impressed with Chilean Seabass that I had it for dinner for EVERY night of my vacation. I tried to have it for breakfast one day too, but that didn’t pan out.

Friday was much sweeter, more gentle. Lizzie went to work and I stayed behind in her completely DOPE apartment. Her building had an unbelievable gym in it (which oddly none of the other tenants seemed interested in) so I spent a few hours down there, getting my tone on. I went to Whole Foods and got down with some organic, and I strolled in the sunshine. Strolling rocks, fyi. I usually hit Broadway in a full-blown gallop, but I think DC seduced me back into the sauntering fold.

Anyways….

Lizzie got home from work and we motored off to my second DC meeting. We got dinner on the waterfront (more Chilean Seabass, WHAT?!?!?) and then hit a hookah bar. I can’t remember who brought up the psychic idea first, but whoever thought it up deserves all of the gold stars in the universe because that shit BLEW MY HEAD APART.

She was Lebanese with bleached blonde hair and a wonky eye (which I thought lent tremendous credibility to the whole scenario) and the second she took hold of my palms, she knew everything there was to know about me.

She knew that I have an unquenchable appetite for tall, dark, and handsome, bad boys. (Who are apparently no good for me)
She knew that I have a love, passion, and fear for my writing.
She knew that I was lacking the confidence to pursue anything creative as a career front.
She knew that I have a big, big problem with shopping and spending.
She knew that I have a big, big problem with stress and aggravation.

She told me:

None of the men around me are really worth my time right now.
Just after my birthday a blonde man will be coming who is a match for me (I’ll recognize him because I will find him boring, but she swears that’s a good thing)
It’ll be 2 or 3 years easy before I have the confidence to live my destiny and create for a living.
I’ll be back in school by the fall.
I’ll live into my 90’s (which kind of scares the bejesus out of me. I’ve always looked forward to dying young. Hmmm.)

Lizzie almost fell out of her chair a few times, and I just sort of sat there with my jaw on the ground. It was a magical thing, but not always happy or safe. Her biggest revelation was that construction was a very temporary occupation for me. She stressed again and again that money isn’t everything, and the work I’m doing now is NOT MY CALLING. Seeing as I’ve been actively killing myself to make my job work out for me, I wasn’t too thrilled to hear that. She said nine more months and then I would have to quit. They’ll throw money at me, and I’ll have to decide what’s more important, money or my wellbeing.

We started scribbling down our prophecies when we got home and planning out Saturday…..

To be continued….

Mtherfcking M*nday.

2009-04-29T10:48:00.005-04:00

I’m back in the normal NYC hustle and bustle after five blissful days of vacation. It’s alright, I suppose. I seem to have retained some of the peaceful equanimity I picked up in DC, and I certainly had a mind-expanding spiritual experience. Mind-expanding spiritual experiences should accompany EVERY vacation or you really haven’t gotten your money’s worth, in my opinion. Trust.

But before there was Paid Time Off there was the impending Nervous Breakdown. I’ve been as forthright and honest as I could be about the fact that the last few months for me were holy shit storms of stress and aggravation (almost entirely work-related). Well, last week, just when I was convinced it was as bad as it could possibly get, it got worse.

Mondays are rarely awesome, but some Mondays set a tone for the week so outrageously horrible, that you find yourself praying for a quick and merciful death in lieu of the work week you find yourself facing. I had that very Monday. The day started with typical client complaints because I was trying to schedule inconvenient but necessary construction into their occupied space. So I gave up trying to get my workers where they needed to go and then my bosses RIPPED ME NEW ASSHOLES for not aggressively scheduling my work fast enough. It was raining and cold and I dressed for sunshine. I was four days off sugar and trying not to drink coffee, so I couldn’t really articulate my standard quick responses, and it was noticed. And commented on, frequently. I ended up just grinding the work day out. I absolutely could not wait to get home so I skipped the AA meeting, and went straight for the subway. I got off at my stop, and started trudging home with my head down against the rain when some Asshole in a beat up Toyota decided to bounce me off his windshield.

I got hit by a fucking car? WHAT?!?!? Did that really happen? Am I alive? Am I hurt? No, I’m…..what the fuck am I feeling right now………oh that’s right, ANNOYED.

The cops came, the firemen came, the ambulance came, and 40 minutes later I was allowed to continue walking home in the rain. The Asshole never got a ticket, but I was extremely lucky to have not been killed, so I let it be. I had only been home, shaking, for a few hours when I got a mildy poisonous text message from a newly sober girl who I had agreed to collaborate with on a recovery book. She had arranged for us to meet with a literary agent the next day (that meeting was set weeks ago) but decided to cancel the meeting, using my car accident as an excuse, until we could “get on the same page”. I used the cancellation of the meeting as an excuse to liberate myself from a book proposal that was just not sitting right in my conscience.

The long and short of it is, I had seduced myself with dreams of book related fame and glory (and an escape from construction). And she was such a talented writer in her own right, that it was hard not to get excited about the idea of what we could create together. But something kept needling me in the dark hours of the night, and the more I ignored it, the more signs of strain started popping up in our burgeoning partnership. At that moment, it became pretty undeniable. I'm in no position to be telling other sober women how to live happy, useful lives. I'm certainly in no position to be collecting money off of my proposed "solutions". I am still, obviously, trudging away to learn how to do that for myself. I know that I have books in me, but that's going to happen in Divine Time, not according to a schedule I try to force on myself.

I sat on the edge of my bed and tried to tally up my day. Gnarly, shitty work day, and I would rather carve out my eyeballs than go back. Fantasy book deal completely SHUT DOWN by me, no less. And hit by a car. If my karma is now bad enough for me to be getting hit by cars, what kind of a realistic life expectancy can I have in NYC? Maybe 6 months? A year? How does one go about spiritually rebounding from an experience like this?

I took Tuesday off, and thank everything that is Holy and True, I had scheduled a vacation for that Thursday. Wednesday was spent at work showing off my bruises and contemplating the deeper meaning of what had just happened. Was my HP telling me to LITERALLY check myself before I wrecked myself? My soul’s radar may not be the strongest, but it is there. And past experience has revealed to me, that when everything in my life goes fucking BOOM at the same time, it’s because I’ve strayed too far from Divine Will for me. My course is always in need of correction at that time, and this time around I suppose, the Holy Powers That Be decided a car/body collision was the only way to snap me out of my workaholic trance.

So I decided to surrender, yet again, to God’s Will. I prayed all day, I prayed all night, and the next day, and the day after that, for him to show me what exactly he had in mind for me. I promised to take his guidance seriously this time, and set aside my own ambitions and agendas.

Ask and ye shall receive, no? I got the divine instructions, over the next five days of my vacation. Jesus, I was really getting ready to sell myself short there. And that, kids, is the moral of my story. My meager mortal plans for myself are nowhere near as fitting, amazing, and BIG as the plans of my higher power. If I stick with my will, I end up with fuckall. I surrender to The Only Will that Really Matters Because He Always Wins Anyways, I get the power and the glory and the kingdom. Forever and ever, man.

Who knew?

Ingenue

Let's try this again, shall we?

2009-04-11T09:12:00.003-04:00

I am having a really lovely, enjoyable life experience right here in this moment. This is a good thing, because I had a fucking miserable week. I mean really goddam grueling. I could sit here and list off all of the external forces bringing me down (I blame the MAN) but the truth of the matter is, I'm miserable and I'm making myself sick. I'm hurting alot, and the more I try to make the pain go away, the worse it gets.

I've bleached myself out, I've shopped myself silly, I've starved, I've binged, I've smoked, I've caffienated, I've raged, I've withdrawn, I've worked, I've run miles and NOTHING gives me a moments peace. I just keep running faster and faster and faster.

I'm tired now. I don't want to run anymore.

So where does that leave me? If I can't live with my external pleasure traps, and I CERTAINLY can't live without them, what the hell am I supposed to do?

I'll do the only thing that can be done in a situation like this, a first step.

"We admitted we were powerless over alcohol - that our lives had become unmanageable"

Unmanageable. Unmanageable?!?!?! Again? But I'm sober now! And I manage really important and stressful construction, why can't I manage my own internal shit? This can't be happening again, it can't be. And yet, here I am.

I cannot make it through my work days without making an emergency shopping stop halfway through the days.

I made myself throw up three nights ago after a sugar bender gone awry. SUGAR, Jesus Wept! I'm eating it by the pounds to alleviate the emotional turmoil inside me.

I cannot manage my emotions, I never could. I am powerless over my pain and my attempts to shove it back down. I am powerless over alcohol and my life is the definition of unmanageable. You know, I actually started admitting that last night, and ever since, my life has been noticeably nicer. Acceptance and surrender work miracles, I've known this for a while.

pow·er·less
(pour-ls)
adj.
1. Lacking strength or power; helpless and totally ineffectual.
2. Lacking legal or other authority.

I am powerless over alcohol, I am powerless over my own emotions, I'm powerless over BOYS, I'm powerless over work.

E

Blonde Ambition

2009-04-03T14:48:00.002-04:00

When I was a little girl eagerly awaiting adolescence, there was nothing in the world I wanted more than my own Style. None of the other girls at that age had any Style either, but their Mom's did, and every morning they showed up to school perfectly primped and coiffed (In over-sized Gap sweatshirts and side ponytails, as was the style then). The Moms with Style always managed to dress their daughters in a balance between trendy timeless. Basically, they set the bar as to what you were supposed to look like in the 6th grade. And woe betide you if you couldn't fake the funk. Kids be vicious.

My Mom had absolutely no Style, but God bless her, she tried. She tried to dress me like DJ from Full House, but I usually ended up looking like a rumpled Kimmy Gibbler. Kimmy Gibbler with a Salt n Peppa asymetrical haircut, although I can't remember if that was Mommy's bright idea or mine. Suffice it to say, I was an absolute mess. I suffered endlessly for it. Adding insult to injury, we moved twice a year, so I was subject to regional bullying standards in, like, every state in the union. What's hot in Concord, NH is trash in Toledo, OH and I had to learn this the hard way. Over and over and over again.

My Mom would seriously spend our rent money for new outfits for me. I would come home begging for her to take me to the Mall, sobbing and crying because of the humiliation I had lived through that day in school. She and I would shop all night trying to find something for the next day, a perfect outfit that would win me friends, enhance my attention span in class, and make life bearable.

To this day, I haven't found an outfit that can do any of that. But I've never stopped looking.

These days, I do have Style. My alcoholic overcompensation to those childhood tortures was to create a BULLETPROOF external image that would morph into whatever I needed on any given day. I can take the temperature of any new city's fashion climate in 5.3 seconds flat. Before the end of my first night in a new home, I've changed my hair, revamped my wardrobe, and either gained or lost approximately 4 pounds to suit the level of curviness I think would be best to fit in with my new surroundings..

The things is, if I'm fairly mentally healthy and things are going well I dress down, I relax, I smile. If the shit is hitting the fan, I need 90 outfits in 90 days. And Manicures. And 60$ Lipgloss. And Caffienated Cellulite Cream that's probably a rip-off. And Perfect Eyebrows.

This is the state of mind I was in last night, when I decided to respond to an emotional crisis with a new dye job. For the last 2 years, I've been black haired, blue eyed Irish. My hair has been every length and style known to man, but the color scheme has stayed consistent for a minute. Sometime around 2:30 pm yesterday afternoon, black hair started to feel like the MOST AWFUL, most constraining, most wildly unnecessary burden to ever lay itself on my shoulders. I had to be blonde, and I had to be blonde, like, yesterday.

I called my stylist who is remarkably inconsistent in her abilities (to lazy to find a new one) and told her I'd pay her anything she wanted to give me Sienna Miller's golden shaggy bob. She swore it could be done, I booked it down there, sat through four or five scalp scarring bleach sessions, and then.......I was done. When she unveiled the finished product, all hell broke loose inside me.

"THIS IS NOT WHAT WE DISCUSSED IRMA!", I screamed. I swear to god, the entire shop came to a screeching halt. Everyone was giving up their undivided attention to the bitchy (and blonde) white girl losing her shit in the corner. "This. Is. Not. What. I. Asked. FOR. Where the fuck is my hair? Why is it orange?"

Irma just rolled her eyes at me, because unfortunately, this is not the first time this has happened. Their was a Halloween Highlighting Incident (which I truly thought we had gotten past) and a Rihanna Wannabe Haircut Episode (you'd think I'd learn about asymmetrical cuts) but this one was a Defcon 2 level meltdown in the works. I was expecting to feel peaceful, sexy, and powerful in my new hair, and instead I saw my desperate sixth grade self staring back at me in the mirror.

I was not prepared. My new roomie had to scrape me off the sidewalk to get me home. Mind you, there's absolutely nothing wrong with my hair. I've actually gotten mad compliments on it this morning. But it wasn't what I was expecting. And my expectations must be met or chaos ensues.

Sigh. Isn't that always the point? My expectations always lead me astray. They promise me happiness and contenment and instead deliver me frantic scrambling, grasping consumptions. The more I try and satisfy my desires, the more desires I have. And I still can't get no satifaction.

But when it comes to outward appearances, I cannot be trusted. I am a Chameleon to the fifth power, and powerfully deceptive to boot. The more I try to control the "image" I am presenting the less control I have over my reality. God, I am really this much of a control freak? Huh. Who knew?

But today, I still have the drama and the wreckage of my past from yesterday to deal with. No amount of hair bleach can take that away. Although, I will admit that I'm about to do a minor Sephora shopping bender and probably a mani-pedi.

That's just me chasing my bliss.

Ing

Goddammit, Hotmail.

2009-04-01T10:31:00.003-04:00

My Hotmail is such a perpetual source of misery for me. Emailing in general sits on top of my latest shitlist, with good reason. It is not a clear, concise method of communication but it masquerades as an easy, breezy conversation tool. Text bombing can fuck right off too. I'm so over e-bonding. I refuse to dedicate anymore time to trying to unravel obtuse emails, searching out emotional subtext and finding only inane emoticons.

For whatever reason, almost all of the difficult conversations in my life are pumped through my Hotmail. Like attracts like, you know, and I'm a busy girl who tends to avoid awkward conversations for the sake of productivity. So naturally, most of my closest relationships feature people with the exact same character defect.

It wasn't always this bad, but for the last 6 months every time I fire up my personal inbox I have this gnawing, gnashing dread in my stomach. My ex-roommate has a lot to do with this. Although I lived down the hall from him, whenever he had something unsavory to tell me, he'd email blast that shit at 8 in the morning. I'd be plugging along in my work day and I check my mail on my blackberry and all of the sudden, THERE HE'D BE. Reading me the riot act for some imagined slight, trying to make his money problems my issue, passive aggressive little shit-bombs that hit their mark every single time.

I have a low threshold for idiocy.

So I did the only mature and sober thing I could think to do. I blocked his email addresses.

The Evil One got used to getting big, firey emotional responses from me everytime he poked, so the first day that I didn't freak out via email response, he started to meltdown. He opted not to discuss the matter with me in person, that would have been a little too normal for us. Instead with three days my spam box started filling up with hundreds of emails with bizzare subject headers and Sci-Fi Sender Names. One such email, subjected: "I never stopped thinking about you" caught my attention and wouldn't let go. Upon opening it I discovered another one of the Weenie's misspelled rants.

is this your twisted version of restren of pen and tungue? why can't u be a better person? if u have to be that miserable you shold just drink, because u r a waste of sober life.

See what I mean? Charming, right?

These days the web trauma has branched out into other areas of my life My new sponsor seems to like conducting our sober business over text and email and it's just not working out for me. I send these emails out into the abyss crammed full with whatever is tanking me, and if (this is a Big If) I back it up with a text, a phone call, and another text, she may respond with a few sentences of her own. There's no eye contact, there's no back and forth, there's no body language. Everything's left up to interpretation and my alcoholic mind REELS when trying to get a grasp of another's online motives. She and I are still getting to know each other and emailing as opposed to talking in person DOES NOT A DAMN THING TO FACILITATE THAT.

(Also, you know how the bible says an eye for an eye? I firmly adhere to the doctrine of an email for an email. If I write you, hit the reply button. Common courtesy, there.)

And Facebook, don't get me started on Facebook. Facebook is born of Satan, and I think we all know that. I don't need any online social community tempting my stalker tendencies. Let those sleeping dogs lie, alright?

Basically, what it comes down to, is that I have been found guilty of making people jump through hoops to get my attention. When left to my own devices, I avoid and isolate...I bridge-burn and ignore. At some point my Hotmail kind of became like Switzerland to all of the warring factions in my life. They decided they could seek asylum in my inbox with their undetonated psychic bombs. And I've been left with the wreckage of that, an irretrievably broken relationship with online socializing.

Basically, I want to get off my computer and back into real life. This is my goal for the coming weeks. I can't change anyone else's behavior towards me, but I can def curb my own habits of avoidance! That's within my reach, baby, and I plan to bravely set foot into reality where fact is fact and fiction can be left alone.

Other than that, I'm praying, resting, detoxing, socializing, loving, healing, crying. More on that to come.

Cheers bebes,
Me

Smiles and Sunshine

2009-03-13T15:55:00.000-04:00

I feel good. 'nuff said.

:)
Me

Oh Jesus. Now this?

2009-03-08T14:15:00.001-04:00

Are you a Workoholic?

Do you get more excited about your work than about family or anything else?
Are there times when you can charge through your work and other times when you can't?
Do you take work with you to bed? On weekends? On vacation?
Is work the activity you like to do best and talk about most?
Do you work more than 40 hours a week?
Do you turn your hobbies into money-making ventures?
Do you take complete responsibility for the outcome of your work efforts?
Have your family or friends given up expecting you on time?
Do you take on extra work because you are concerned that it won't otherwise get done?
Do you underestimate how long a project will take and then rush to complete it?
Do you believe that it is okay to work long hours if you love what you are doing?
Do you get impatient with people who have other priorities besides work?
Are you afraid that if you don't work hard you will lose your job or be a failure?
Is the future a constant worry for you even when things are going very well?
Do you do things energetically and competitively including play?
Do you get irritated when people ask you to stop doing your work in order to do something else?
Have your long hours hurt your family or other relationships?
Do you think about your work while driving, falling asleep or when others are talking?
Do you work or read during meals?
Do you believe that more money will solve the other problems in your life?

I answered fuck yes to all of the above. Now what?

Ingenue in Wonderland.

2009-03-07T11:28:00.003-05:00

Listen, I have something to admit, and I really would rather sit here blowing smoke up your (and mine) collective asses. In fact, so deep is my denial to the reality of the last few weeks that I've already mentally written this blog posts a few times with my fantasies intact. But alas, there's only one truth and that truth is, I have been renamed the Bacon Egg and Cheese Bandit.

My planned detox was going swimmingly. I was all about the spinach smoothies, watermelon, giant salads, and cooked food whenever I saw fit (as long as I didn't imbibe dairy or gluten). I FELT AWESOME. I had five toxic pounds melt off me and I wasn't stressed about my food. Big opportunities started chasing me down and, for a minute, it looked like all my dreams were on the verge of coming true.

Then my life happened.

I had already been putting in 10to 12 hour days on my site (normal for me) when three things happened in quick secession:

1. My co-worker announced he was taking an impromptu vacation during the most crucial part of our construction schedule.
2. A design got approved for a section of my project that requires MAJOR STRUCTURAL work and excrucitatingly long shifts to execute it.
3. It was decided by the heavens above that I would be covering the balance of the hours (basically day and night).

Hello 17 hour work day! You want to laugh? 15 hours is now a day off for me. 19 hours happened last Friday, and more often than not I'm dragging myself off this incredibly needy jobsite WISHING I could convince men to build for me just one more hour, because I don't know how this is going to get done otherwise.

But there are labor laws to prevent that sort of thing and that's really just me talking crazy anyways. I'm up every morning at 5 am, on the job by 7, and rarely hitting my bed before 11pm. FUCKING BRUTAL. At first, I was almost catching a bit of a buzz of the long hours (it's all too easy to become addicted to your work. Trust.) but now, I'm tired. Really, really tired. I'm balls deep in heavy construction mayhem and I can't see my way out anymore.

Basically, the month of March will consist of Ingenue building like her ass is on fire and little fucking else. Good thing I love my work. I got alot of it.

But that's not all! Adding insult to injury, my Arch Enemy Roommate has decided to rent out my room underneath me, effective April 1st. Meaning, I am also trying to find a new apartment right now and dealing with the emotional shitstorm this injustice has brewed up in me.

I stayed with my detox for the first few days and (with a slightly larger cooked food ratio) and then before I knew it: I ate. I mean, I ATE. It started with the first BE&C Bagel which tasted so amazing that I promptly chased it with another one. That day for lunch, I had a ginormous burrito dripping with sour cream. I had three Americanos for dinner and two california rolls for a midnight snack. I felt sooooo much better. I felt heavy and weighed down which can feel surprisingly grounding when your life seems to be speeding on without your consent. I slept like the dead that night. No strangely psychic dreams (a frequent occurence when I'm high raw), just a mild case of indigestion and a sore lower back.

And it went on and on. I haven't put on any weight, but that's solely due to stress and running around for 17 hrs a day. I feel like poo, but for the life of me, I really don't know what to do. Change that, I do know what to do. From here on out, I'll take it day by day. The thing is, I'm getting really good at taking care of myself. Seriously I am! But it takes time to be self-nourishing and that is the one thing I do not have these days. Also, I feel like all of my habits these days are reactive instead of proactive. Every morning I'm popping digestive enzymes and amino acids in a desperate bid to repair myself from yesterday's work abuse, so I can do it again. And again. And again. Eating well and exercising to try and keep your body in top physical condition is something else entirely. That feels so far away from me right now.

Those are the sins of yesterday. Today I write this with a coconut water and a bucket of cantaloupe next to me. All I can do is get up and try again, right? Construction will always be construction and Ingenue will always be the one and only In-gen-wheeee. I WILL learn how to do what I do and eat what my body needs at the same time.

No victims here, baby. And I'm done volunteering for ill health and untapped potential.

Mucho besos,
I xoxoxo

This is more like it!

2009-02-25T08:37:00.002-05:00

Aha! It was just as I suspected, last night's funk was little more than an emotional detox. OK, so maybe I had no idea what was going on between my ears yesterday, but I feel worlds better this morning. I mean really stellar. Thank heaven's I didn't do anything rash. I would have missed out on the most fantastic morning, I've had in a month of Sundays. TODAY TOTALLY KICKS ASS AND CALLS IT SALLY.

Or something like that.

My favorite lucky breakfast is canteloupe, watermelon, and grapes. But I've been too busy to make a trip to Whole Foods, so I've been relying on the deli across 42nd for my supplies. Sometimes they have watermelon, sometimes they have grapes. Occasionally they will have canteloupe AND grapes. Today? All freaking three. Angel choirs sang when I gazed upon that fruit salad bar this morning. Golden Jesus Beams radiated from the heavens.

Yesterday my job site was a pile of tears, heartbreak, and failure to me. Today? We're shouting it out and it's getting done. I love constructive shouting. This is not arbitrary, abusive, ass-reaming. This is two parties with equally valid points squaring off and raising their voices to the fucking skies until the matters resolved. And then you crack a joke or two, break some balls to signal the end of the dispute and everybody walks away content. It's deeply cathartic and a shitload of fun. (Unless you're on the losing end of the conflict, which I NEVER am). Ha.

What freaking happened to me last night while I was sleeping? Was I Jedi Mind Tricked and I didn't know it? Did the On Demand episode of Rome I was watching hypnotize me into a positive headspace? I'm not the one to look a gift horse in the mouth, so I'll just take this fabulous morning where I look completely adorable, and run with it. It's pretty staggering how much an attitude change can alter your reality. Like, whoa.

And to all those beloved souls who reached out and held me together through my dark night of the soul, it made all the difference in the world. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU.

xo
Ing-ee-nue

Wow. I REALLY hate being an Alcoholic today.

2009-02-24T18:06:00.002-05:00

Alright, I know I'm a drunk. My body doesn't respond to alcohol the same way a "normal drinker's" would, and because of that I CANNOT DRINK SAFELY. Horrible, wiley, petulant things just happen to me when I'm drinking, and so I cannot. Can't be done. Tried that, didn't work. So why, why, oh sweet jesus, why am I STILL longing to be able to stuff my face with shots at Happy Hour with my Bosses?

Because I am a freaking Alcoholic and part of that is craving something I can never imbibe again. Although last night, I seriously considered cashing in my 1 year and some month chips for a one day coin that I could collect with my shiny happy hangover at a later date.

I DID go out with some workfolk last night and while the night in itself was unremarkable, the spiritual hangover I have this morning is threatening to derail the little bit of sober sanity I've put together. I usually bristle at meetings when oldtime AA's decribe our sort as "crazy" or "insane" but today, I know exactly what they mean. Only a truly batshit crazy woman would come out of the kind of alcoholic wreckage that I have and consider going back for any reason. And the reasons I want to go back are ill advised at best.

I miss drama. I miss self destructive flings that hurt more than they please. I miss hotel rooms with crisp white sheets and married men between them. I miss fuck me heels and smeared mascara. I miss whiskey breath. I miss beer tears. I miss the miserable and cocky little girl that I was, and I'm afraid of the women I'm growing into. I am freaking grieving for my drunkeness like I've just lost a parent. Probably more since neither of my parents are really that stellar about showing up when their needed. But you know who has ALWAYS been there for me? Jamesons! And now I've divorced him and I can't help but wonder if it wasn't a horrible, horrible mistake.

You know transformation is such a terribly long and tricky process that it's no wonder I'm feeling lost in the shuffle right about now. Some years back I lost 60 pounds. I think it took two years when all was said and done. But there would frequently come times when after a 3 pound weight loss that I HAD FOUGHT FOR, I'd look at my new body and think, "What the hell good has that done me?" My knockers were limp, my stomach gathered in these weird ruffles above my brazillian. It wasn't a linear process, is what I'm saying, and I spent more time in between sizes, swimming in ill fitting clothes than I did prancing around in tiny bikini's.

But now, years later when I've been an enviable size and shape for quite some time, I hardly ever think back to that long, protracted era of EXTREME PHYSICAL DISCOMFORT. I only reap the benefits. I feel like this is what's going on in my sobriety right now. I'm too far into my transformation to turn around, and I'm not far enough to see the light at the end of this fucking birth canal.

So, uhh, yeah, day 8 of the detox is clearly bringing some repressed emotions front and center. *grins sheepishly*

It's all good. I'm off to catch a meeting and share my little irish ass off. Good luck and God speed friends.

-I

Well, well, well....

2009-02-23T11:38:00.003-05:00

I am WITHOUT blackberry today. This is, in equal measure, both liberating and terrifying. I clearly have access to my laptop, or I would not be able to blog about my terror now. So there is that. For what it's worth.

I'm actually feeling sort of Xena Warrior Princess today. The morning was a bit rushed and rocky, but once I started digging into the day's conflicts I found my hidden backbone. I've said it before and I'll say it again: Anyone can maintain spiritual equilbriam during happy times. It's how you ride the rocky road that shows you where your faith is REALLY at.

Last night was a snoozy, ignoring my obligations, detoxing, self-indulgent, sort of extravaganza. I napped until 8 pm, woke up and started sampling an assortment of Larabars, watched HBO movies until 2 in the morning and then slept until 5 am. I'm not saying that's an ideal night of REM cycles, but it was kind of fun and I felt fine this morning for it.

Until I walked into ALL HELL BREAKING LOOSE on the job at 7:30 this morning. For a moment, I was regretting my secret of night of tv viewing, but I had no choice but to dive in to the center of the mayhem. The water was surprisingly warm....

My mind is far more clear than it has been, my anxiety levels are way low for such a nasty day, and I'm extremely present in all of my activities. I'm noticeably more productive and organized and sarcastic comments aren't sticking to me like they normally would. To me, this is truly Raw Food in the Real World. This is Principles and Programs in action, and baby, it's fucking sweet.

Earlier in my sobriety I frequently bemoaned the fact that maintaining a spiritual existence on a construction site was a magic trick on par with curing cancer. "How the f'ing hell am I supposed to manage that?" I'd weep. I refused to take responsibility for my chosen line of work and I really expected to be given some sort of crown after any day I'd managed to work 12 hours without a tantrum. But as I've grown up, I've had to admit the truth. It was no accident that I ended up in a male dominated industry, scrambling after a postion of power. There's something I want to prove to myself here, and the world isn't about to stop spinning while I get on with it.

It helps me to get clear about this sort of thing when I'm upping the work I put into my program, or cleansing, for that matter. Because I can tell everyone else whatever I fucking please, but if I don't know where my own motives are...well....I'm sunk. Bliss and Nirvana are lovely and all that, but I'm a brick and mortar, results oriented sort of girl. I want to know which parts of my psyche work and which ones don't. I want to maximize every single hour available to me. I want to build like my ass is on fire and love like it's the last day on earth. Sobriety hasn't cured me of my alcoholic extremism and I sort of hope it never does. :)

Life is short, very short, and I need to know what makes it sweet for me. Day 5 of cleansing has left me with my mostly core self, and not to brag, I'm kind of perfect.

Thought you should know.
Ingenue

Big Love, baby.

2009-02-22T21:53:00.002-05:00

Today was a good day. It wasn't the day I had planned out for myself, but it was good. I have a new sponsor (yes, another one) and we had a tasty little chat after That Big Meeting today.

I came home afterwards, and I MEANT to workout and study, but instead I napped for 5 hours. 5 HOURS. It was soooo nice.

I woke up and strolled down to the organic bodega around the corner and armed myself with Lara Bars for a Big Love viewing session. Lara Bars have new flava and they are flipping scrumdidliumptious. Coconut Cream and Pistachio make my nipples hard. Equally.

So, where does that leave me? I end day 4 with some mild detox symptoms, achy knees, and a lethargic dreamy countenance. I am excited about upcoming endeavors, but not my usually ambitious self.

Right now, I'm still working through something R told me over brunch.

"We're Sober now Ma. There are no more victims here. There's only volunteers."

Quickie, quickie....

2009-02-22T07:35:00.002-05:00

Day 4 is upon me and the one thing that I AM SO FREAKING HAPPY ABOUT RIGHT NOW, is that my digestion is VERY happy about the food change. There's no way to pussyfoot around this subject, so I'll come right out and say what's on my mind.

When Raw Food is working out for me, pooing is like the most enjoyable experience ever.

When Raw Food isn't working out for me, the constipation, bloating, and uncontrollable gas explosions make me long for a quick death.

This time around Raw Food is working, working, working. Mind you, I've made alot of mistakes along the way, and now there are some food combinations I know to avoid. No nutmilk fruit smoothies, for instance. Shit makes me swell up like a beach ball. If my fiber intake, like, triples over night (as it will anytime you switch from cooked to predominantly raw) I know to up my water big time in the beginning, to move it all through.

Listen, it is categorically impossible to feel sexy and gassy at the same time. This is not my vanity, this is not me being a weenie. Never in the history of raw foods or vixens has a woman managed to pull off a full scale seduction while worrying that any minute her bowels might decide to eject a steady stream of Volatile Organic Compounds. And Raw done Wrong can lead to weeks and weeks of gassy, constipated, autointoxication. I've had to learn this the hard way.

The last time my elimination system went on strike because of Raw Foods I tried to be a man about it. "Toughen up, bitch!" I sternly admonished myself. "No one's ever gotten a fully detoxed cell structure by complaining about every little stomach ache and grumble." Of course this self directed vitriol only managed to make my stomach hurt worse. That time around I learned that my bowels will happily close shop if I don't talk nicely to myself. :) Stress and anger constipate me as quickly as bad food does.

Who knew?

Ingenue

Day 3.....

2009-02-21T09:21:00.004-05:00

Anecdotally speaking, the third day of ANY new dietary shift is a BFD. Your body is starting to get wise to the fact that you're seriously not going to be giving it what it's craving. Which is a good thing, because at three days into a cleanse your cravings are unlikely to be centered on anything wholesome. :) Once you start purging addicitive foods from your diet (and dairy and gluten are damnably addictive. How many times have you heard someone says they couldn't live without cheese? Or bread for that matter? Total junkie thinking) your body starts to go through the withdrawal process. As a woman who's been forced to withdraw from a variety of substances MANY, MANY times, let me offer my hard-won expertise on how this business goes down.

Stage 1, HOLY SHIT ACUTE WITHDRAWAL
Lasts: anywhere from a few days to a few weeks.

This is it. You're learning to live without something that's no longer working for you and your mind and body are in full scale revolt. Your emotions are all over the place, drama levels are running high, and you have this internal itch that you'll never be able to scratch. Physically, depending on what you're trying to kick, there's a very good chance you feel flu-ish and miserable. For some reason whether you are trying to come off heroin or quit sugar for good, withdrawal always feels like the flu. Of course the levels of severity are subject to change. :)

Remember: You are utterly powerless over this addiction, whatever it may be. Pray for patience, pray for strength. One day at a time, yeah?

Stage 2, PINK CLOUD, BITCHES.
Lasts: a few weeks, a few months, if you're karma's REALLY good- maybe a year.

To quote Big Boi: It's like a brand new pair of reeboks or a junkie freshly detoxed. You feel the tingling all over like convulsions or the rooster pox...
Who knew you could get catch a fucking buzz from being abstinent???? But it's true, and never fails. The minute your body stops withdrawing, you temporarily enter the blissfully orgasmic state of.....hmmmm.......pink cloud pleasure mania. It's not quite happiness, although it can be easily confused for it. It's certainly not a bad thing, and you're actually hoping you can stay on Cloud Fuschia forever and ever and ever. But alas, this is not to be. This a rest and recovery station, not a permanent home. NOWHERE IS THE PINK CLOUD MORE OBVIOUS THAN IN RECOVERING FROM FOOD ISSUES. For example: You're three weeks on raw food and you feel amazing. You've lost six pounds, you're never hungry for junk, and after a long traumatic history with binge eating, you feel in control of your body and what goes into it. Could it really be this easy? Might you finally be free from this horrible shit show?

Not exactly. As soon as you start asking these questions it's time to move into.....

Stage 3, RETREAT DAMN YOU, RETREAT!!!!!
Lasts: as longs as it needs too.

And you were doing so well! Yesterday you were optimistic, upbeat, looking forward to your new life and today you are resistant, surly, and downright combative with anyone who makes the mistake of getting in your way. Your body is feeling amazing without the... (booze, sugar, dairy, cigarettes, whatever, take your pic) but you can't help noticing that your emotional self is...uhhh....pretty fucking emotional. Without the haze of a sugar high, without the release of an hourly nic-stick, you're just strapped in for the Feelings Freefall. It. Is. Exhausting. You're starting to realize that you weren't just eating because you were hungry, you didn't starve yourself for all of those years because you were dieting, and nobody who's mentally well drinks to blackout four nights a week for fun. Something big is going on inside you and it's been there for a very long time. It's utterly terrifying, and you are FULLY WILLING to eat, drink, or smoke whatever you need to MAKE IT GO AWAY.

It may sound gnarly, but this is the stage where the girls become women. Anyone can stay clean on a pink cloud, but every day you stay away from your chosen substance in this stage is a freaking miracle. You're turning within, you're wading through your inner muck, you're surveying your internal damage and decay. You've been sick, really really sick, and you don't know what's going to make it better. DO NOT QUIT BEFORE THE MIRACLE. You are brave and beautiful and as crazy as everything seems, you don't want to miss what comes next.....

Stage 4: REVOLUTION BABY (By way of Acceptance)
Lasts: as long as you'll let it. :)

You give up. You're surrendered to the reality of YOU, not what you think you should be. You need what you need, you want what you want, and all you really know is you don't want to go back to where you were. Regardless of what you're feeling, you're managing to act (and action is far more important than words or feelings) like a woman who loves herself deeply. Your body expects and wants wholesome foods and your mind doesn't argue. You engage in some serious downward dog when back in the day you would have been binge drinking. You still stumble here and there, but you KNOW it's all good. You're feeling more protected and nourished then you have in a very, very long time and you have the courage to live in the present moment and not in your fantasies. You feel your feelings and then get on with your life.

This is totally the stage where the student is ready and the teacher is appearing. You'll start meditating more, examing toxic relationships, and reaching out to new soulmates. Your creativity will be at an all time high, and you are truly firing from all cylinders. ENJOY THIS SHIT. Just enjoy it, you've freaking earned it! Healing hurts bad sometimes, but did you give up? Did you cash your check? No, you did not! You rock, in a big way, and no one knows what the future holds for you. Whatever it is, it's guaranteed to be beyond your wildest dreams.....

Into the beyond, my beloveds.

Ingenue

Counting, counting, counting days......

2009-02-19T13:41:00.004-05:00

Alright that wasn't fair. I know it totally makes it sound like I've relapsed, but seriously, I loved counting days. It was a very special time, although a time I have no intention of repeating. God willing. Still, there's something magical about a ninety day bench mark. The bible says, "Give it but a season" (that's ninety days for you atheists out there) and while I usually gloss over the finer points of the Holy Word, they've made a believer out of me there. In three month's time, miracles can happen. In three month's time drunk girls can morph into sober chics. Anything you can commit too for 90 days can be safely considered for a lifetime.

So imagine my joy when the effervescent Raw Divas suggested a pre-spring 90 day cleanse! HOOK A SISTER UP. This has been a winter of All Things Cooked and Sugary for me, so I need to release some toxins in an epic way. Cleansing for me is one of life's greatest joys. I have a tendency to attract spiritual clutter in my day to day existence, so periodically, I need to STOP and let go. The beautiful thing about cleaning out your body is that the rest of your life follows suit. You find yourself emptying out your closets, cleaning off your desk, and letting go of old dogma that no longer serves you.

It's like working The Steps on your saddlebags.

And this is a really beautifully thought out detox too. It's called....drumroll please.......

THE 90 DAY STOP BEING SO OBSESSED WITH WHAT YOU EAT DETOX

I know, right? Freaking Brilliant.

I have huge, beautiful, life changing things ahead of me this spring and I need some space to welcome in the new parts of myself I haven't met yet. So here I go. Detox/Cleansing is a HUGE way to let the Universe know, you're open for business. And Universe, I am so unbelievably ready for you.

So I will be posting my adventures in produce here. Day 1 has been filled with:

Cantaloupe and Grapes
Beet/Carrot/Apple/Spinach/Dandelion juicies
Spinach/Avocado/Cashew Salad
Coconut Shake
Raw Vegan Oreo (num num)

The only rules for right now are religiously avoiding Dairy and Gluten (two MAYJAH disgestion stressors) and loving yourself into absolute oblivion. But check out these chicks for yourself. They'll give you the proper lowdown and they're worth supporting. To Self-loving women out to make the world a happier, healthier place? Can't beat it.

http://therawdivas.com/blog/

When was the last time I told you I loved you?

Now.

Luv, luv, luv youse.

Ingenue

I'm tellin all of y'all,it's a SABOTAGE!!!!!!!!!

2009-01-21T12:31:00.002-05:00

Well this is a fucking fabulous day. I'm eleven days off cigarettes, three days of all sugar and refined carbs, and one glorious day into my period. I actually feel like I have the flu, but what that actually is, is anybody's guess at this point.

My body is crying but my soul is flying. Somehow, insanely, no matter how bad it hurts right now I'm holding on. The truth of the matter is that I'm tired of being a smoker and frankly scared of the obvious damage I'm doing to myself. When I was younger, I could shake that shit off. I had no fears of painful and drawn out deaths, I was impervious to Quit Smoking Campaigns. I was surely unbreakable in the way that all alcoholic adolescent twenty somethings are. Now, it's all changed. I hurt in places I never hurt before. Compulsive behavior eats away at my sense of wellbeing and I know how to set my addictions aside (work those steps baby).

I'll admit that the decision to give up sugar so early into my smoking detox came as a total shock to me. Yes, I do frequently surprise myself. I've always been desperately sugar sensitive. I just don't react to the stuff like my other girlfriends do. One chocolate inevitably means 15 chocolate and a crying jag and some sort of sugar hangover the next morning. And shakiness, nervous tension, and irritabilty until I have some more. Remind you of anything?

It's always been like this, but I think smoking was somehow disrupting the full cause and effect of my sugar binges because when I quit puffing, that blood sugar ride got DEADLY. I actually passed out on my bedroom floor after I lost a fight with some Magnolia Cupcakes. Blackouts? Passing out in my clothes? REALLY? I'm sorry, but that's a little too close to active alchie-ism for my comfort. I'm going to have to tap out.

So I started reading some of the OA stuff (the resident sugar abstinence geniuses) and I identified left, right and all over the place. Although I don't have a weight problem, I have no control over the amount I eat when sugar is involved. I lie, I hide, I do all kinds of weird shit to obscure my eating habits from inquiring minds. So giving it up was a no-brainer, but still scary. No smokes, no sugar, no sanity? Is that sort of thing even possible?

Well thankfully for me, it's VERY possible. Because here I am doing it! And I feel so lovely and authentic that whatever cravings and discomfort pop up along the way, I KNOW that a cigarette and a snickers bar are not gonna make a damn thing better. Just like when I counted days....I have that same knowing.

It's totally revitalized my sobriety and I'm so proud of myself. I have no will power whatsover, but willpower in this sort of situation does you no good anyways. What's needed is willingness. And this I have in spades......

What I can't do for myself, I'm willing to let God do.

Et voila. No smokes, no sugar.

Ingenue

Magical Thinking. Friend or foe?

2008-12-13T07:52:00.002-05:00

Well I'm back, and just to get the pre-functionals out of the way, I'm 13 months sober and on my eighth step. Are we happy now? Oh, I don't mean to be non plussed about my sobriety, it's a miracle, I'm so grateful, yadda yadda yadda.

It's just, well, sobriety is sort of my normal state now. When I first started this blog I had only 69 days sober. (69, snicker) And while my lessons haven't stopped, my obsession to drink has been soundly lifted. So I have to remind myself DAILY that this wasn't always so. Once upon a time, Ingenue couldn't stop drinking no matter how hard she tried. Or how bad it got. Once upon a time, Ingenue was convinced she couldn't make it to 90 days sober. Because this girl forgets all too easily.

These days it's my life, and not my hangovers, driving me BATSHIT. Every time I think I have my plan of attack together, every time I think I have perfected my outside appearance of competence, something else (usually of a professional nature) happens and knocks me right back into the crazies. I'm actually really happy with the way things turn out, in the end, but I just haven't really felt balanced or sane for (hmmm) months now? Is this something I should be concerned about?

It's work. The actively alcoholic version of Me picked out the single most stressful job I could have imagined some 13 months ago. I wanted the paycheck, the uniqueness of being a young female in a man's industry, and the outside perks that I thought I couldn't live without. So whilst still in my alcoholic manipulative abilities I managed to talk my way into this position. And I did so with the best of intentions! Suffice it to say, this job is actually a tremendous amount of work, and I struggle with myself daily to not throw in the towel. I'm far more capable than I've ever let myself express on a consistent basis. And now my life is demanding that capability from me.

Enter the Magical Thinking epidemic. I really didn't know there was a name for what I had, but there is and as long as I can remember I've always, ALWAYS been a magical thinker. I've been reading Cosmo Bedside Astrologer since I'm like, eight years old. And believing evewry word of it! But far more importantly, shit like the Secret, and manifestations and all that....that stuff gets me. Because I DO believe my thoughts become things and I think some pretty sinister shit.

It's really AstrologyZone that fucks me up the worst though. Susan Miller really puts me through it. Last month in the November horoscope for Gemini she called out the full moon on December 12th as being a uniquely horrible and unexpected disaster sort of day. So six weeks ago, I started to quietly panic. I had big shit scheduled for Decembr 12th! I had a liscensing, and talks with the Bosses scheduled! WTF?!?!?! And more importantly, was there any conceivable way to innoculate myself against said Uranus/Saturn conjuction? Was this the sort of thing that major affirmation therapy can counteract or was I just a sitting duck?

It really only got worse from there. Everytime I tried to convince myself that I wasn't taking it that seriously, something would catch my attention and I would convince myself it was a foreshadowing of this awful upcoming full moon. In fact these little things would convienently manage to pop up whenever I was most desperate to avoid the reality of the work sitting right in front of me. Mayhaps an addicitive personality should not be trusted with the belief that she can access advance knowledge of her future, eh? Maybe, just maybe, this throws off the whole one day at a time thing. For this alcoholic, anyways, the zodiac has become a real avoidance therapy.

Sober life is so fast moving! Everything's always growing and shifting and changing these days, and my reliance on horoscopes has always been an attempt to get a strong grip and ride it out. (And I was relying on horoscopes long before sobriety, but whatever). The point is, things that worked for me in my drunken girlhood, don't always work for me in sobriety.

I'm getting the idea that my online horoscope addiction is yet another thing to be chucked into the DO NOT TOUCH UNLESS YOU LIKE THE IDEA OF RELAPSE pile. There's work to be done, and it's meant to be done between my HP and I. So my prayer:

God,
I am utterly powerless over my addiction to online astrologers and soothsayers. And while it may not seem like a big deal, I don't like the fear and the free floating anxiety it encourages in me. I don't like the time I spend searching through 13 horoscopes for one that makes me feel better. I used to think you spoke to me through online horoscopes, but now I'd rather find another way for us to communicate. This is getting too weird and painful. I can't seem to break this habit, but I know that you can relieve me of it. Please do!

Amen,
Ingenue

P.S. I'd also love to be a non-smoker, a size smaller, and the single best super in my company. But, all in good time. All in good time.

So this is what the Otherside looks like......

2008-11-23T13:11:00.002-05:00

I'm well over 1 yr sober now. Did you know? It's been a wild ride, but here I am. I've been through a fourth step, a fifth step, a near layoff, and a craigslist addiction and yet, I'm still sober.

Bless,
Ingenue

2008-09-12T13:30:00.000-04:00

May?!?!?!?! I last blogged in MAY? Yeesh. Well, I really don’t have much to say for myself other than the fact that it’s flown by. And once again, I’m at a loss as to how to update. So much has changed. I’ve really changed and whoever’s run around harping about how people never change needs to spend some time in an AA meeting or six. I’m simply not the same girl. Cue David Bowie- Turn to face the change, baby.

I was emailing a beloved girlfriend from back in the day and trying to have the same conversation. What’s going on with me? In the modern girl world you give the rundown: Seeing someone fabulous, just broke up with an asshole. Got promoted, thinking about quitting this dead end job. New apartment, hate my roommates. You know, the stuff that ends up making a life, a life. Everybody understands when you speak on these levels, and as you get older the stakes get a bit higher. I’m getting married, he’s divorcing me. I’m having a baby, we can’t get pregnant. Your women understand, they’ve been through it as well.

Unfortunately, I don’t have any of these external circumstances to excuse my radical inner shift. My life these days is less about what’s been added and much more about what’s been taken away. I’m coming closer and closer to the true core of myself, and I’ve discovered some startling things about who I really am.

1. I can’t have casual sex without getting emotionally involved. For anyone who doesn’t think this is a giant epiphany please feel free to reference earlier blog entries where I was OBSSESSED with finding myself no strings attached lovers. It’s a little thing and a big thing all at the same time. Does this mean that I’m never going to date again? Absolutely not. Let’s not be rash here. I am in my sexual prime, after all. It’s just that if I do it, I need to be prepared (honestly, truthfully prepared) for what will REALLY happen. I don’t need to elaborate here do I? Is there anyone who hasn’t been through the infatuation = insecurity gauntlet?

2. I have FOOD ISSUES. I have Capital F, Capital I freaking FOOD ISSUES. And these issues revolve around what the hell’s going on in my head far more than what I’m putting in my mouth. It’s something to do with restriction and reward, a sort of psychic binge and purge mentality. When my life starts moving too fast and I flip out, the very next course of action for me is to start severely restricting calories, carbs, cooked food- you get my drift. In times when I should be really gentle and nourishing with myself, I inevitably choose to rape, pillage, and plunder my inner warehouse. The flip side of this is that when I’m spiritually well, I make fantastic food choices that please me greatly with no mental debate involved. For me, it is truly an inside job.

3. When I’m not having sex with someone, I eat a lot more.

4. This Bad-ass Ex-Rebel Chic needs her goddamn routines. End of subject. For someone who used to court chaos and mayhem on an hourly scale, this is truly a sign of some sort of sober apocalypse. I like waking up at 5am, I like working out, and then I get my meditation on. I take my time in the shower, roommates be damned, and I blow dry my hair. I catch the 6:43 train and I’m on my site by 7:06. After that all bets are off, but by God, my mornings are mine.
I still don’t like paying my bills. Sigh. Sobriety’s taking it’s sweet time with that one. However, not paying my bills upsets me far more deeply than it ever did before. When I was a younger woman I could blithely ignore eviction notices and nasty black marks on my credit report. Now if my landlord so much as gives me the side-eye in the middle of the month I’m running for my checkbook. So I am paying my bills. But that doesn’t mean I have to like it. Ingenue’s Electric Bill = Instant Resentment.

5. I am one Grateful Bitch. Sometimes I get shy about openly expressing my Gratitude (especially in meetings where there are buttloads of snarling, grumbly, oldtimey men) but express it I must. I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve my recovery but I’m so happy it’s happened. I’ve spent a lot of my life in deep suffering and what I suffer I tend to inflict on others. My misery has brought turmoil to the lives of just about everyone around me so as I get better, they get some much needed relief as well.

I’m so fucking golden right now. I’m a basketcase and a mess most days, but I’m an honest (and hot) mess. Being me- day in, day out- kicks gorilla ass.

I’m just saying.

Brave New Day....

2008-05-20T11:35:00.002-04:00

Whew....I've pulled out of that one just in time. What is that "one" I'm referring too? Ummm, that would be the weird funk/depression/mind fuck that completely consumed my 6th month of sobriety. I can't say all's been lost. I'm still sober. I feel stronger, and all around more enlightened to the true nature of my inner self right now. All the pseudo-spiritual jargon what-have-you's aside I've been through something incredibly profound. I've grown up.

I wouldn't say it happened in the last month alone, but it's been the past 4 weeks where I've really felt the growing pains. I didn't realize that's what was happening. I thought I was experiencing some sort of total mental collapse. Last week at this time, I would have sworn to you I had no central nervous system left. What with all the pacing, sobbing, and newly developed nervous tics. That shit was oogly and baffling to boot! I had no idea where it was coming from. One week I was on this massive social bender; drinking coffee until 4 in the morning with cute boys, female bonding sleepovers, and meetings out the yahoo. Fellowship, bitches! And then, with not so much as a whisper of warning, I changed my mind. I started retreating from newly developed friendships, I started throwing around excuses not to go to my favorite meetings. (Although, it must be said, getting routinely bitched out by a 6'2" tranny while trying to get programmed seemed like a completely valid excuse at the time).

I started spending more time in bed. I started crying. And once the tears started flowing, I wasn't sure they were going to stop. I spent entire nights crying at my walls. I was completely incapable of carrying on a conversation with Mama Dearest w/o dissolving into hysterics.

"Mom, it's bad. Seriously, I've never in my life been this low before....I'm just in so much pain..."

That was the God's honest truth. I was in huge amounts of pain and the first thought that sprang to mind was, "Now would be an excellent time to relapse."

Sigh. Feelings suck.

I didn't relapse, I've climbed out of my pity pit, and I'm slowly putting the pieces back together. Alot can go awry in four weeks of self-destructive sobbing! Rent can go unpaid, flights tend to remain unbooked, dishes stay unwashed. Everything stagnates, life-wise, without the bare minimum effort required. I've learned this the hardway.

But the solution...oh the solution's been glorious...more on that to come....

xoxo Ingenue

(The solution has involved lots of Dr. Wayne Dyer, Yoga, Raw Foods, Parliament Lights, and Prayer. This is the recipe for a total miracle, let me tell you...:)

Where has our love gone, Blog?

2008-05-07T15:10:00.002-04:00

I do not feel witty or inspired. I do not like re-reading blog postings that don't read like little slices of genius. I do not like have my musings misinterpreted and dissected by well meaning commenters. Because of all of these things, the passion has cooled between us Bloggy. And I'm sorry for that. If it makes any difference at all, I've missed you dearly. I have no idea how to catch you up on all the shit that's gone down since my last post, so I'll keep it to the day at hand. The past is frankly irrelevant (and yet, strangely, it never quite leaves us does it?)

So here (in no particular order) are the greatest hits of my day:

I'm ragging but it's not as bad as it's been. It kind of just snuck up on me, honestly. I also think there is DEFINITE divine reason at play here, becaue I'd been toying with the idea of getting some lovin' (different guy, of course) but this obvs puts the kibosh on that for the moment.
I haven't eaten lunch today and it's 3:24pm. I'm not sure how I feel about that.
I've gotten a new sponsor who I am thrilled about. I've wanted to work with her since I the very beginning of this strange, sober journey. This is a really happy thing for me.
I've not yet told GSBF that he will no longer be sponsoring me. This is a really troubling thing for me.
There's a boy (I swear it feels like there's always a boy) and instead of making me happy it's made me a bit, well, psycho. My inner voices have turned on me and I find myself compulsively checking my email every two minutes for more thrilling bits of discourse. My Mother says the boys are going to keep popping up to terrorize my serenity until I learn NOT TO ATTACH MY HAPPINESS TO THE ACTIONS OF MEN (or anyone else for that matter).

But isn't that the spiritual quest of anyone's lifetime? Not to attach? I try, I do try, but despite my best efforts, niggling little thoughts sneak in and grow into the hundred armed hydra, sucking the joy out of my psyche. Right now, that's not such a bad thing to be going through tho. Everytime my thoughts turn to J and what he's thinking about, and why hasn't he responded to my witty bon mot, and whatever else; I am aware. I am keenly aware when I start debating with myself over whether or not I'll go to my favorite meeting because he may want to take me to dinner AT JUST THAT TIME. Everytime I leave this blog post to check my hotmail for a word from him (totally just did that) I think, can this be right? Am I really that girl?

And the answer is a resounding, yes. And no. It's a definite maybe, anyway. I've been that girl for a very long time. And those habitual thought patterns are influencing my situations today. But that doesn't make it true. It's all in my head, literally! And that's why I will not be shying away from the emotions that dating is drudging up. That is why I'm ok to tell on myself. Let what lives in the dark come into the light! Fuck it! True self love is accepting yourself exactly as you are, with no revisions. This is my headspace now and it's all good....

Getting out of here to grab some chow and hit a meeting....

xoxo

Let's stay in touch blog-

Ingenue

Maybe my character defects aren't so bad after all......

2008-04-17T11:09:00.003-04:00

So I have this thing. It's called major fear of intimacy and it rules my interpersonal relationships with an iron fist. Upon first meeting me, you'd never know that this was the case. I'm open and gregarious and if anything presumptively intimate. I'll tell you about the horrifying female ejaculation exploit when I was nineteen that has forever haunted my sexuality. (He was convinced I had peed all over his futon and I was ill equipped to argue with him seeing as I had never left that kind of tsunami in my orgasmic wake before. Awful, right? I didn't cum again until I was 21. I was completely traumatized.) I'll listen to your battle tales with an open and understanding mind. I come across as completely candid, fun, and non-judgemental.

And in that moment perhaps I am. But only for that moment, because in the moments that follow my overactive ego gets to work scrutinizing every single word, thought, and action you've put forth. And let me be the first to tell you, my new friend, you do not look good. This is where the crisis begins. You now think that I have no issue with our sudden closeness and your guard goes waaaay down. You start sharing vulnerable things with me. Your vulnerabliliy makes me feel vulnerable and I DO NOT LIKE TO FEEL VULNERABLE. I start inserting some distance and you start hanging around more trying to understand why the hell I'm acting like that. The more you cling, the more I withhold, and soon there's a big BOOM. You are now dead to me. I openly ignore you in public situations. You openly discuss the fact that I'm a misanthropic bitch.

It happens again and again and again in my male and female relationships. I find it deeply upsetting especially since it is just so evident now in my sobriety. I can't think of anything more pressurizing for a personality disorder of this magnitude than regular AA attendance. Jesus H. In six months of sobriety I've been through 4 BFF's and 3 Brothers From Another Mother. Clearly, I still see most of them on a daily basis. It's not as awkward as it may sound though. Ignoring their existence is modus operandi for me. I've been doing this since adolescense. I am, in fact, a pro.

Do I want to change this behavior? Absolutely. I've felt horrible and bitchy and un-spiritual for months now. But last night I decided to let myself off the hook a little bit. There appears to be a direct correllation between the co-dependent fellowship friendships I've been running through and relapse rates. Every one of the aforementioned folks has relapsed in the time we've known each other. And as tempting as it may be to pin the blame for that on my inherent bitchiness, I couldn't have kept them sober. The problem here is that I'm attracted to the dysfunction. I revel in it and encourage it, until I get scared for my own sobriety and then I get the FUCK out.

I haven't had a drink in six months. It has not been easy, pretty, or graceful, but I've done it. Every good thing that's come into my life has been a direct result of not picking up that first drink. Deeply held behaviors (fears of intimacy and the like) will have to be released but that's going to happen on HP's time, not mine. Until then, all I can do is live by example in my current state. Trying to be best friend to every sick and suffering chic that walks through the doors of Perry Street is not the answer. And I really have to look inward to find what I'm trying to validate surrounding myself with these folks. Quality not quantity right?

Hmmmm. Asking the Cosmic questions and humbly awaiting the Universal replies.

Spring Awakening.....

2008-04-14T13:02:00.002-04:00

Color me humbled. My ass-getting (and subsequent morning after pill-popping) adventures have gone all awry. Self-will run riot? You think?

I took the reins back and it nearly landed me in a very messy situation. Those innocent little morning after pills really freaking put me through it. Freakish hormonal outbursts, two days of vomiting, and so much more. And was my partner in crime there to support me through this mayhem? Not so much.

Although this was a boy that I had counted days with and known as my friend since I first got sober, although he had no problem coming to find me whenever he was in need of a free dinner, when I wanted someone to watch movies with me through my isolation it was a rather douchey no.

"Well, if I came over there and took care of you, that would be, like, intimate, and I don't know, not physical."

"And? It's not like I created this vomiting situation all by myself, brother. You can't watch a movie with me anymore?"

"Not unless there's a hummer involved, no."

Ahhh. There you have it. The anatomy of a 13th step fuck-off. To be fair, we had discussed the whole no-strings aspect, but we hadn't taken into consideration the inherent fallibility of prophylactics. Life on life's terms will undo the best laid plans, yeah? Is there some sort of human compassion quotient involved here?

It's a moot point anyways. The sheer rage and powerlessness I felt in the moments getting off the phone with him propelled me through my nausea and straight into a meeting. I sat through one (only wretched twice) and then another (no wretching) and then the third. By the third meeting, he had shown up and was witness to my single rolfing session.

Somewhere in between the puking, the two days w/o food, the three meetings, and the sheer unmanageability of the consequences of my actions, I started to feel better. Not just better from the weirdness of this last week, better in my program. Better in my life. I feel peaceful now. Something really shitty happened, and I don't want to drink. Someone that used to be my friend totally disappointed me and I don't feel any resentment. And as a wise man once said to me:

"You better pray for God's will, girl."

"Why?"

"Because that's what you're going to end up with anyway."

LIFE!
Ingenue

P.S. T- I'm praying for you. I pray that you have the amazing sex life that I want for myself. I pray that you only have requited attraction in your affairs. I pray that you be free from rejection and emotional trauma. I pray that you feel loved, respected, and envied at all times. Don't say I never did anything for you, man.

I got some!

2008-04-08T16:52:00.001-04:00

Ass that is. And it was much fun. We had the preliminary "no strings" convo before we got to business (I've had enough of dating expectations and disappointments for a minute. I want to close out my first year sober in peace...) Then we got to it! SO. MUCH. FUN. Right up until the moment we discovered the condom had exploded. Sigh. What are you trying to tell me here, HP?

So seeing as birth control Plan A had thoroughly failed us, the next morning Lover and I moved on to Plan B. This was my first experience with the morning after pill. I can't say I'm thrilled with the exploding condom scenario BUT it is refreshing to be sober and ready to take a responsible, decisive action here. And that is where I become extremely grateful that Plan B is available to me.

So yesterday I got the pills and took them. This was after some worry that I may not be able to procur them, seeing as I possess no legal identification. It was a non issue then but it prompted me into overdue action. See, I haven't had an ID since LAST MAY. I left it in the back of a cab after a drunken spree and I have lived under the radar ever since. I'm like Jason Bourne. I have no identity. Booyah!

I have my ss card, my bank card, and a picture work ID. I've flown across the country with these! Its been real but its time for me to get legal again. And that, my friends, is why I am blogging to you from the DMV. Otherwise known as Satans Asshole. I've been here for 3 hours and I believe I may be here for 2 more. I've mentally recited the Serenity Prayer 85 times and I am running STRAIGHT to a meeting when the finally set me free. There is a homeless chic standing in front of me who reeks of fried pickles. I've been breathing in fried pickle smell for three fucking hours. Oh lord. Deliver me.

Life on lifes terms can be a dull, dull affair.

Sober nonetheless,
Ingenue

Little in the middle? Meh, not so much.

2008-04-03T11:56:00.002-04:00

I've gone chunky my friends. It was to be expected, and yet. Sugar Keeps You Sober and If You Want a Drink, Drink a Milkshake. If You Still Want to Drink, Have Another and fuck off already! I did some mental calculations when I first quit drinking. I added up all of the calories in a fifth of Jamesons and subtracted it from daily total of calories consumed. I then subtracted the calories burned from the nervous pacing and fidgeting so prevalent in early sobriety. By my calculations I should have lost 35 pounds already. What the eff gives? HUH?!?!?

I'll tell you what gives. Just when you think it's lifted it's shifted (Yes this will be a highly sloganized posting. It pleases me.). Meaning, while my alcoholism is now lying dormant, that addict obsession has shifted over to my relationship with food. This leaves me with nights like last night. I lost a major battle with a Family Size Box of Velveeta Shells and Cheese. Sigh.

Most of the time, I feel like absolute poo, as well. I am very, very sensitive to sugar and my sugar addiction is raging right now which leaves me in an icky state. Inside and outside. My digestion is fucking whack, my moods are uncontrollable, and my love handles are bulbous. Again, sigh.

I need to get this out, because I have deep emotional trauma connected to weight fluxuations. Here and now, I should probably qualify that although I feel fat, and I beat myself up for being fat, I am most definitely not fat. I'm 5'10" and a size 8. But just a scant year ago I was a size 6 and I adored that. I adored that because my beloved (and deeply overweight) mother has had me convinced since Infancy that BAD THINGS DO NOT BEFALL SKINNY PEOPLE. The reason my father abandoned us? My mother's unsightly saddle bags of course! The reason we lived in abject poverty? Fat people do not, as a general rule, get good jobs. This was (is) my mother's dogma. So when I blossomed out of my chubby childhood into a tall and lanky adolescence my mother was certain that this was a divine sign that I (unlike her) was destined for happiness.

She was also certain that pulling me out of high school and getting me started modeling at the age of 13 was going to save us both. I won't even go into how much that colored my current relationship with my weight. Shit, I won't go into how that colored my current relationship with drugs and alcohol! It sent me off to the races. We can leave it at that. Oh, Mama. She really believed that I (skinny-minny me) would have peace and abundance that she never had. Which means to this day, I feel like I'm failing her when I find myself edging up into the next dress size.

So is the answer me going on another diet? Nah. I naturally really do dig healthy, vegan food. I eat the other shit to be self destructive. It doesn't even taste like food to me! I like to workout (although I don't because I have a big issue with showing up for things that are good for me.). I need to start healing some of this stuff, and I don't know how. It hurts to feel this way, it really does. It hurts to look in the mirror and feel disgusted by a spare tire that's not even that big. It hurts to not approach boys I like because the thought of getting naked in front of them makes me nauseous. It hurts to feel like I need to be locked away because I've got 7 lbs of back fat. To be fair, some of the 7 pounds seems to have been distributed to my boobage. Which is, admittedly, a plus.

Lighter inside, if not outside.
Ingenue

That's more like it!

2008-03-31T13:49:00.002-04:00

I am so unbelievably happy right now. I'm sitting in what will eventually be my teams new site office. Right now it's just me, my music, and the most amazing view you could ever hope for. I've moved a desk over to the floor to ceiling windows and I'm looking at the giant 4 Times Square sign. 47 stories up baby! Which means I'm ill placed should another terrorist attack go down, but hey. I live in the moment.

Happy, sober, and starting to get the hang of this life business.
Ingenue

'Ello.

2008-03-28T14:58:00.002-04:00

I haven't much to say but I thought I'd keep the space alive. Alive with the sound of hormones....:) Spring is hitting me hard in the lady bits and the Universe has been offering me plenty of potential partners to fantasize about. Much like a man I am absolutely incapable of sustaining regular brain activity with all the increased blood flow to my nether regions. So if I blather, please forgive.

He was freaking gorgeous! 6'2", Ryan Phillipe look alike in a leather jacket and a hot ass fedora which was precariously perched on his knee while the speaker rambled. I normally don't stick around for that particular meeting, but, Dear Sweet Holy Herbie am I glad I did. I was up and milling about in the back when he sat down in the chair next to mine. He was one of those lounge-y types who sort of sprawled out in his space. Usually that sort of thing annoys the shit out of me. But if it meant his knee edging closer to mine? Sprawl away, my boy! At one point something strange was going on with the speaker and he slowly looked over his shoulder and smirked at me. It was that knowing smirk, the kind only fellow alchies can exchange. It was a smirk that said,"Oh, it's going to be one of those qualifications, is it?" It was a smirk that also might have been saying, "One of these days you and I are going to fuck until your ears pop. You don't mind, do you?" Anyways, he smirked, and I swear to you, I shivered.

And there it was. My missing mojo back in action. Did I get his phone number? Did I blow him in the bathroom? Nah. That was not the point of his presence. I think the divine reasoning of that little encounter might have been running more along the lines of, stop making yourself crazy with these overly serious dating shenanigans! Follow your loins and unburden your heart! It is not that flipping deep, girl! (Yes that is my Higher Power's vernacular. This is the God of my choosing. Piss Off, please. :)

Whatever it was, it was truly delicious. Mmmmm, yes please!

Ingenue

Fellowship...

2008-03-19T09:54:00.001-04:00

Gemini Horoscope for week of March 20, 2008
It's an excellent time to seek out new allies, expand your social network, and make connections with influences that will motivate you to grow smarter and stronger. Here are the kinds of connections you might want to be on the lookout for: 1. hard workers who find everything funny; 2. down-to-earth idealists who place no emotional value on having expensive possessions; 3. nerds who are cocky in mysterious ways; 4. humble perfectionists who obsess over the integrity of every little thing they do and then mock themselves for being so conscientious; 5. couples who hold hands and jump into big puddles with their nice clothes on; 6. sympathetic listeners who will kindly kick your ass if you need it.

........

2008-03-18T10:26:00.002-04:00

I hate boys! Freaking cock-sure cunt ass motherfucker bastards! Off with your heads! Both of them!!!!!!!!!!!!!! FUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKKK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Whew.

I feel better now.

Fuck me, I'm dating.

2008-03-18T08:51:00.002-04:00

I think I am, in any case. What I mean to say is, I met a really great guy and we had an amazing dinner. And then we had great coffee/convo, we even went to a bar. He had a Guinness. I had a Diet Coke. We kissed outside the train station and he asked to see me the next day. I went over to his place and we watched two movies, ate another amazing meal, and enthusiastically made out. And now, nothing.

I am aware of Mainstream Society's "dating rules" but honestly, I've never really been fucked to follow them. I mean, I am an alcoholic. There aren't many perks with this disease but wanton, drunken promiscuity definitely eliminated the need for small talk. And the Blackout/Shame Spirals the next day didn't leave much to the imagination as to why there was never a morning after call. I have an educated guess.

Every once in a while even the most sloppy of girl drunks will cross paths with a boy every bit as destructive as she is and then you have Co-Dependent Alchoholic Co-Habitation. Works a treat! People can hang onto this sort of arrangement for years. It's usually very on/off but who's counting when you have someone willing to stick around and be the whipping boy to your suppressed rage? Have you ever had a drunken fistfight with your s/o followed by sloppy make-up sex and a nice deep black out? There's nothing to match the bonding moment of waking up with your partner in crime, both of your memories mysteriously wiped clean, wondering out loud together why the sofa in now wrong side up in the bathtub. Good shit, my friends. Good shit.

But this is no longer my modus operandi. I'm sober and one of those bad-boys I used to obsess over would likely scare the bejesus out of me today. So I'm dating. And it blows! I'm not proud to say I'm obsessing over a return text message, but there it is. It's terribly distracting. Also, the swoon of sober infatuation feels frighteningly close to some sort of high. And the problem with getting high? The law of gravity says you must come down. Down, down, down.

Egads.
Ingenue

May I take your inventory please?

2008-03-14T12:42:00.002-04:00

Sigh. SIGH. SIIIIIIIIIIIGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH. It is that lovely time of the month again and I find myself thoroughly annoyed with just about every one around me. Sponsors that don't show up when they say they will and pull passive aggressive text manipulations on ya, newbies and their excuses to not go to meetings who then act like extremely un-sober peeps because they haven't been programmed. Chest-thumping male co-workers that take credit for my work and call me a "sweet little thing" when they stab my lovely back and con-artist divorce attorneys. All of you can feel free to suck it. I am completely over it right now. I am in a bare knuckled brawl with my HP right now to NOT dissolve into a pity party. Must work my program, must work my program.

And I am. I'm actually barrelling away on my fourth step which is good, attending plenty of meetings which is also good, and getting a fair share of fellowship in which is not so good. Right now I feel like I need fewer personalities and far more principles. I just do not understand how to conduct interpersonal relationships in sobriety. And right now the only thing that causes me serious drink signals is other sober people. Something is seriously wrong.

GSBF keeps telling me to not respond or act out anything when I feel transgressed upon. Restraint of Pen and Tongue and this too shall pass and all of that noise. Well....,ok. I guess if it works for you it should work for everybody. That was snarky, I know but that's just where I am right now. Not writing an email to a person to let them know I'm pissed off does not change me being pissed off. Not being able to tell people to get out of my ass and work their own programs does not give me more personal space. And I am a Champion Grudge holder, seriously, you should see the state of my Inventory. Holy Christ, it's getting pretty hairy.

Anyways, here I am doing this really deep nasty inner work where I am trying to acknowledge the hidden motives within me and the oogliness bouncing around my psyche. All of this stuff is at the forefront of my mind and I just have no patience for other people projecting on me. And I'm not allowed to say anything about it. I'm not well, my friends, not well at all. I'm just going to keep working and pray I come out the other end. Until then, I do plan on keeping bystanders at arm's length. I do NOT need an audience for the work I'm doing right now. Sorry.

TIME = Things I Must Earn,
Ingenue

And again,

2008-03-13T09:03:00.000-04:00

Gemini Weekly

Before you attempt a quantum leap of faith over the yawning abyss, please remove your 500 pounds of defense mechanisms first. Your success in soaring the whole distance will require you to be free of emotional baggage. As long as you fulfill this simple prerequisite, I'm in favor of you risking the transition. It's about time you summoned more zeal to follow the path with heart, even if that path resumes on the other side of the great divide.

Amen.

2008-03-13T09:02:00.002-04:00

Gemini For March 13:

Today begins a period of self-reinvention. Some of you are rethinking your career path and goals, while others are considering a number of personal commitments. If you've been a very public person until now, you may pull back from the spotlight while you figure out what your next act should be. Others seem extremely interested in your activities, appearance, friends and thought process. Each time you encounter another's industrial-strength curiosity, you treasure your privacy even more than you did before. Although you may find yourself being pushed onto center stage, you'd rather be almost anywhere else for the time being. The irony, of course, is that everyone wants to know more about you and finds your circumstances extremely fascinating.

And I'm spent!

2008-03-12T13:25:00.004-04:00

It's all of, what, 1:30 here? Why am I so exhausted? I'll tell you why. I woke up on time today. That, my friends, will do it. Lately I've been sleeping in an extra hour or so, at the expense of punctuality and personal grooming time but, hey. Who's counting?

I am just really, really supremely tired and I don't feel like doing anything today. But I must go to yoga after work or I fear my back and neck will explode with the tension they're holding. What I really do not need to do is go to a meeting tonight. It happens sometimes. It does happen.

Short and sweet. Can't muster up the brain cells to produce more for you. Mayhaps tomorrow.

Ingenue

Did you miss me?

2008-03-11T09:52:00.003-04:00

My poor beloved blog! Holy Jesus, I haven't updated you in like, too long. Goes to show you how busy I am at the new job (loves it) and how much extraneous free time I had at the old (bane of my existence). Yes I am running around like a Very Important Princess but that is absolutely no excuse for leaving you hanging. Dear sweet Bloggedy Blog. I hope you're not too mad.....

Anywho, I barely know where to begin to catch you up! So much has happened in the last two weeks. Most of it is the same old shit, but there are some new developments I should probably highlight. I have a new girlfriend in the program! She's lovely. She's counting days (like really counting days, I think she just got her first week) but she's definitely coming into the rooms with some spirtual cajones. She loves all the same astrology I do and she's a dead ringer for Catherine Zeta Jones but cuter. How perfect is she? Oh I know it sounds like I'm putting her on bit of a pedestal, but I simply can't help myself. I have been so starved for another semi-normal female! I mean she's sick like we all are, but she's so delighful in her disease that I can't help adoring her. Some drunks just got it like that.

She's working really hard too. She's stepping outside of her comfort zones every day for the sake of her sobriety and that is totally inspiring to me. And boy did I need to inspired. I think I was going through some sort of four month/fourth step slump (is there such a thing?). So her presence in this life is deeply welcomed. I hope she wins all the marbles, Blog. She deserves them.

Other than that I still feel like an absolute mess with my internals. I have rage issues and unpaid debts and rage issues because of the unpaid debts and a messy dating life because I keep trying to use boys as an escape from my inside chaos. Whew! And if that's not bad enough, everytime I try to change this stuff I plan out this major psychic overhaul, bite off way more than I can chew, fall on my ass, and end up with five days of deep depression as a reward for my efforts. You know all about this stuff blog. I know, preaching to the choir, right? So unfortunately all I can really do right now is accept my disfunction and try and do any little thing in a day differently. And pray that it all adds up. Every one keeps telling me that not drinking day in day out is winning the battle, but I still feel so wrong. So less than. Like I need to change everything about myself stat. But that's not really the point is it? It's a program of self-acceptance. It's time to start accepting. That is my HP's dearest command for me and it's time to heed the call.

Anyways, I love you Blog! I've missed you more than you know, and I promise I'll write more regularly. Don't be too mad at me, kay?

xoxoxo
Me

Yoga School Says....

2008-03-02T11:19:00.000-05:00

Everyone Deserves Music
"Everyone deserves music, sweet music. Even our worst enemies, Lord, they deserve music. Even the quiet ones in our family, they deserve music!" - Michael Franti

"Tasya Vachakah Pranavah" YS 1.27 God is Om, supreme music.

People begin a yoga practice for many reasons, often times to achieve things like a healthier body, or more relaxation. Rarely do people begin the practice to change the world, but, in fact, this can happen. We need only realize that, as Willie Wonka said, "We are the music makers, we are the dreamers of the dream". It is our dream and our music that create our reality. Modern scientific thought tells us that we are the creators of our own reality and that we are most fundamentally comprised of vibration. Understanding that vibration is simply music, and knowing that our reality comes from the way we choose to perceive things, we can undertake a yoga practice to create harmony in the music that emanates from us. We can use this to shift our perception to truly change the world! Imagine seeing the participants of a yoga class as different musical instruments in an orchestra; each one playing a unique, yet integral, part of the overall piece. As you move through sun salutations, you create a harmony comprised of each person's individual "sound". As you breathe, you create a melody, and as your hearts begin to beat in sync (which happens anytime the hearts of multiple living beings are in close proximity), you create a bass line. If we, as yogis, rally around uplifting the lives of others through our yoga practice, that is the song that we send out into the world. Our individual vibrations emanate from us just as ripples in a pond expand when a stone breaks its surface. What we think, say and do creates the circumstances around us. If we choose to think, speak, and act peacefully and compassionately, those are the vibrations we create, and our reality will be based on those very real thought forms. Yoga gives us practices, like chanting, pranayama, and asana, that will not only help to "re-tune" our instrument - the body/mind - but also cultivate the strength to be powerful voices for change in this fast-paced, out-of-sync world. We don't have to be platinum recording artists to have our voices heard. We just have to do these practices that will tune our instruments so that our music sounds clearly when we sing our vibrational "songs". Imagine your body, your mind and your speech as a song. What kind of song do you want it to be? Music has the power to change lives. You've experienced this when you connect a song to a powerful moment in your history, or if you consider John Lennon's "Give Peace a Chance" as the anthem to the anti-war movement of the '70's. But it's not just the music that plays on the radio that can influence others. The most powerful music of influence is the rhythm that comes from your heart. As you do your practice, consider the choices you've made throughout the day that have been factors in the reality you are creating. Realize that you always have the choice to be more compassionate, more kind, and more in-sync with a peaceful, non-violent reality. Know that everyone deserves music. Not just any music, but music that will inspire, uplift and work its way into our hearts so we may also have the compassion to inspire others. -- Alanna Kaivalya, March 2008

Mama knows best.....

2008-02-28T10:22:00.005-05:00

There goes that. My hopeful nicotine recovery has died an early death basically crushing my soul and mutilating my addict ego. I promised my sponsor on no uncertain terms that if it came to it, I would pick up a cigarette before I picked up a drink. Last night, closing out my 7th day w/o a smoke, it came to that. I was faced with the unthinkable. I folded. I smoked.

My company had a HUGE conference last night where we all had a chance to hear where the company is going, where we've been, and why we are all bright shining stars in the construction cosmos. It was cool, but I was totally twitchy from my nicfits. I also was having pretty extreme blood sugar swings as I've been acting out with all manners of chemically processed sweetness. I am a severe hypoglycemic and my blood sugar is fucked Six Ways from Sunday on a good day. Sugar is not just a no no, it is the root biological cause of my alcoholism. Eating, say, a Little Debbie does basically the same thing to my blood sugar and related emotional stability as drinking a Jamesons and Diet. Of course the J&D will get me drunk, beligerent, and blacked out so that is very bad news, I fully admit this. But the point is Sugar (also known as Satan's Semen) can lead me down the same Rabbit Hole.

But I digress. The conference came complete with an open wine bar. And as I was air kissing a female account executive I got a strong whiff of her Merlot and it unglued me. Shit. I never even drank Merlot. If I had to drink wine it was always Riesling. I'm a whiskey girl first, but white wine would do in a pinch. Red always seemed too cloying, drying somehow. The same way beer would fill me up far before I was as drunk as I wanted to be, red wine would dry me out before my thirst was quenched. My cottonmouth would force me onto water and that was never what I wanted during a bender.

So here I am with wildly fluxuating blood sugar levels, nictotine cravings that have re-doubled, and a merlot aromatherapy session to boot. My mind couldn't keep up with all the simultaneous yearnings, so my body took over and I went outside, bummed a ciggie, and smoked that bastard like my life depended on it. I finished politicking at the conference and headed out to Perry Street to try and catch the tail end of the 6:00. I picked up a pack of Parliament Lights from the Deli around the corner.

I got home and called GSBF, left him a message. Same with the BabyGirl. Finally I broke down and called....wait for it....Mom. My mother is not an alcoholic but she's becoming a black-belt in Alanon since I dried out. She's known this was a long time coming, however, so she's been psychically preparing her Recovery Arsenal for eons. Also, she speaks my language. Like GSBF she's spiritually centered in compassion and awareness and the healing power they bring. I understand what my Mom says, I may not always like it, but I get it at the deepest levels of my being.

It all poured out of me, as it is wont to do when one is sobbing hysterically to one's Mother. I told her how overwhelmed I felt with the magnitude of my addictions, how desperately I wanted to be healthy and free. How far away that felt. I told her about my filthy apartment and how I felt incapable of maintaining a normal and ordered life. How much I loved Yoga but couldn't seem to get my shit together in the morning (clean yoga clothes, yoga mat, and shaved armpits) to be able to do it during the workweek (when I really FUCKING need it). How quitting smoking made me binge on sugar and caffiene and now I feel comatose and despondent. I took a really deep breath and was just getting ready deliver the second onslaught of my self-pity when my mother interrupted me.

"I have two things to say Darling and then, if you must, feel free to continue. Firstly, I have never in my life known anyone as sensitive to sugar as you are. If you've been binging you're going to have to accept that your mind and body are still reeling from that. You're going to feel depressed, there's nothing you can do about it until your blood sugar straightens out."

"I know that Mama, but...."

"SECONDLY, the only way to prove to yourself that you are capable of doing the dishes is to do the dishes."

"Excuse me?"

"You are absolutely right that you were completely incapable of maintaining an ordered life while you were drinking. But you aren't drinking anymore baby! You have no idea what you're capable of now and you'll never know if you don't try out new habits and patterns. Honor yourself for the six days without cigarettes. That's amazing. Take a deep breath, hang up this phone, and do your dishes. It'll change your life. And you can call me back after that if you need to. I love you."

"I love you too Mama." We hung up and I looked at the clock. 9:15. I'm supposed to be getting to sleep now. But I know that's not going to happen, I'm too upset. But I NEVER clean after work! My days are too long! I clean on the weekends, when I have the time. Except I don't do that anymore either, I usually don't feel like it. And then it hit me, that's her point. Take the feelings out of it and do it.

I turned up my ipod and slowly went about the business of de-funking my kitchen. I sang, I scrubbed, I danced a little. Before I knew it the kitchen was clean and my heart was noticeably lighter. I cleaned into the living area and got all the trash up, put my dirty clothes in the hamper, and changed the sheets on my bed. I swept the floors. I burned incense. I stood on my head for a little bit and then climbed into my bed to survey my work.

My apartment looked and smelled gorgeous. And it was 10:00 on the dot. For all of my excuses about not having time and even as nasty as my apartment was it only took me 45 minutes to do a fairly sizable overhaul. Hmmm! And Mom was right, cleaning is a brilliant place to put nervous energy.

You get the result after the action not before. The only way for me to know what I'm capable of is to keep pushing my boundaries. And it's the little actions in a day that are going to keep me happy and sober. No grandiose sweeping declarations of miraculous turnaround needed. Don't drink. Go to meetings. Do your dishes. Love your yoga.

Keep. It. Simple. Sweetie.
Ingenue

If you can feel, you can heal it!! (said with forced optimism)

2008-02-27T09:07:00.002-05:00

I am such a basket case right now! And yet, it's not entirely unwelcome, I wouldn't say it's bad, it's just....odd. It is now a nightly ritual that I go home and weep for 90 minutes before going to sleep. I'm back to having to sleep with the tv on (and fitfully at best) and feeling more than a little disoriented getting ready in the morning. I am unfocused at work, my eating habits are falling apart, my digestion is utter crap, and I am vulnerable and confused. In short, I am back in early sobriety. This is exactly what I went through in the first thirty days of not drinking (actually that was much worse). I thought I was over that but not smoking has brought out the beasties.

But I've made progress! I'm much more comfortable experiencing emotions as they come up. I don't buy into the background story as much, I just feel whatever's there. And my tenacity to endure dis-comfort is amazing! Holy shit! I barely recognize myself. 5 months ago I would have totally folded by now. There is no question that I am changing before my very eyes so it's probably a good thing that I'm getting ready to go into my 4th step. Before I can really get comfortable with who I'm becoming I need to be very clear on who I've been. This is not to say that I am excited about the idea of taking my moral and sexual inventories. But I need to know. I need the clarity....

I don't have much to say, really. All is well and normalizing. I have a new crush who totally has a crush on me back. But as is always the case, the timing is not ideal. I think I'll let him take me to dinner though, can't hurt. Work is good. Yoga is necessary. House cleaning severely lacking. My home definitely looks like the inside of my psyche right now and IT AIN'T PRETTY. LOL. But I am loved and I love right back. I am grateful and strong and supported. I'm uncertain and uncomfortable in my nic-fits, but I know that I'm just where I should be. Everything is perfectly imperfect, how wonderful is that?

It's all good, my lovelies. All good.
Ingenue :)

For you...

2008-02-26T11:17:00.001-05:00

ST THERESA'S PRAYER
May today there be peace within. May you trust God/dess that you are exactly where you are meant to be.
May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith.
May you use those gifts that you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you.
May you be content knowing you are a child of God/dess.
Let this presence settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love.
It is there for each and every one of us.

Real Women Wear Hard Hats.

2008-02-26T09:00:00.005-05:00

Otherwise known as:

Day 6 with No Ciggies

Holy Jeebus, I do believe I've quit smoking! There have been some ugly moments in there for sure but following the advice of one of the Oldtimers, I made up my mind to go through whatever I had to go through. I also like the Nic-Anon mantra of "The cravings will pass whether you smoke a cigarette or not." That's helped. Overall, it's been pretty by the book. The first 72 hours were when the cravings were the worst. After that they got manageable but repressed emotions started popping up for review. On Sunday night I got hit with a wave of grief so palpable I felt like someone had just informed me of my mother's untimely death. It was that real. I just couldn't stop crying, so I hit my knees and prayed for guidance. I've heard that this sort of thing happens, grieving for Drugs and Alcohol like they're real people, but this was a first for me. After the spell passed I climbed into bed and scraped together whatever hours of sleep I could manage before work.

Which leads me directly into: My Promotion. On Day 2 of No Ciggies, The Powers That Be called me in to discuss my permanence within the company and matters of monetary importance. In laymen's terms, I got a raise and a new fancy title. It was actually really nice (although it stressed me out and gave me 45 nic-fits in quick succession) and I felt very appreciated and supported. There was one quick moment of internal hilarity when The Big Guy said, "We have a new policy for new hires. You don't mind submitting to a drug test and a background check, do you?" My soul smiled at that one. For the first time in a long time a drug test is no problem. Background check? Meh. There could be anything on there, really. I've turned that one over to my HP. They don't want to lose me and if I have to explain embarrassing incidents, I will. Honestly, I have no idea what could be there. No arrests, but my credit report is nearly criminal. And given the fact that I'm getting ready to start my 4th step I'm feeling extremely grateful that their not hiring me off of the contents of that!

I very much need to buy some new work clothes yet I find myself competely unwilling to go shopping. And the times I have dragged myself out to go shopping I have been so reluctant to lay down my credit card and commit to my purchases. Where is my gender given "shop till you drop" gene? Can they revoke my ovaries for this? I have money and I have genuine need of new clothes. What is my damage here? I even know exactly what I want to get. I'm working out a new personal style I like to call "Construction Chic". This, for me anyways, is the ultimate fusion of functionality and fashion. (I've put alot of thought into this, can you tell?) I'm going to be on a REAL DEAL construction site so I need to be dressed appropriately. Work boots, khakis or cargos or corduroys, hard hats, all of it. I've found that Uggs can easily be substituted for Timberlands with no drop in comfort or stability, and Gap Wide Leg khakis make for sturdy yet feminine work pants. After that all I need are a few new sweaters and hoodies because the site is unheated and BALL FREEZING this time of year. See how crazy this is? I even have my purchases picked out and I won't buy them. Hmmm.

That's really it. I'm still working on synthesizing all areas of my life. Sobriety, Work, Yoga, Play, and Love are all demanding equal amounts of my time. My life is close to being synchronous, but I have to remind myself continuously that it is a Day at a Time. I have the most power for change available to me in this day, this moment. I can't believe I'm about to type this BUT as long as I do my damndest to make each day better than the last, I'm on the right track. And with that incredibly cheesy sentiment expressed, I'm out.

Hoping all is well and off to read Johno's 4th step blog entries!

xoxo Me

Holy Hell! I got out just in time....

2008-02-22T09:39:00.002-05:00

July, August, September 2002
HEALTH

Smoking Yogis, Beware!
Pranayama increases the dangers of cigarettes
By Dr. Swami Gitananda, India

When I was just a school boy, cigarettes were referred to as "coffin nails." Every puff was another nail in the coffin. We were aware even then of the dangerous effects of tobacco upon health, but at that time, in the early 1940s, there was not much factual evidence. Today, there is.

Yet surprisingly, cigarette smoking has actually increased. Billions of dollars are being spent trying to find a cure for cancer without any regard for its cause. We want our bad habits and good health, too. It can never happen, for we are defying nature's laws. If we remove the causes of disease, we can have natural good health. Some of these causes are difficult to remove because they are created by impure air, pollution from industry and motor vehicles. But we can always stop smoking.

Many sincere yoga students believe that they can continue to smoke cigarettes and offset the harmful effects by doing extra pranayama (breath control). This is a dangerous assumption. Pranayama opens up new cells to atmospheric air. These young, tender cells may be more vulnerable than the older, more resilient, cells. Pranayama may actually be more dangerous for cigarette smokers. This is particularly true if one feels drowsy after doing pranayama. Or, after smoking a cigarette that "used to give them a kick," they now experience a let-down. The condition is popularly referred to as "shirt pocket poisoning." More technically, it is "carbon monoxide suffocation."

The carbon monoxide in the cigarette smoke displaces the oxygen in the lungs, creating a poison, causing chemical suffocation. Among the detrimental effects of this suffocation are a hazing of the mind, drowsiness, a reduction of visual sharpness, a slowing down of reflex reactions, an increase of blood pressure and, among longer range effects, hardening of the arteries. Nausea and dizziness often accompany these reactions, indicating a reduction of the output of blood from the heart.

In the normal metabolism of bodily processes, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide are created when hemoglobin gets broken down in the blood. Normally, in a healthy nonsmoker, less than one percent of this hemoglobin gets broken down each day. But in the light smoker it's about three percent, and in a heavy smoker eight percent or more.

Above the one percent range, a slowing of thought as well as feelings of being tired and lethargic are observed. When a three percent level is reached, visual sharpness is impaired and acute sensitivity to light is experienced. It may here be noted the relationship between blood impurity and the increased need for eye glasses. At five percent the skin appears to be shallow and often takes on an ashen or dusky hue. Babies born to women in this grouping already have a bloodstream set for all the diseases associated with addiction to nicotine. The child is actually born with the craving, and his or her skin often reflects the toxic state of the mother.
At seven percent, heart disease is a corollary. Susceptivity to any condition considered epidemic is suggested by a reading of twelve percent or more. Here the blood vessels are heavily coated with cholesterol, inviting disease into the body. Cigarette smoking reduces the blood flow, but raises the blood pressure.

There is a dangerous trend among modern yoga teachers to separate one's lifestyle from yoga. Immoral persons who indulge in bad habits and pose as experts in pranayama and meditation call themselves yogis simply because they have a flexible body. This is an obstruction to spiritual life.

Dr. Swami Gitananda was a yoga teacher in Pondicherry, India, the author of 25 books and publisher of Yoga Life, a journal still continued today. He passed away in December, 1993, at 88.

How do you spell s-y-n-c-h-r-o-n-i-c-i-t-y?

2008-02-22T08:06:00.002-05:00

TUT... A Note from the Universe‏
From: The Universe (light@tut.ccsend.com) on behalf of The Universe (theuniverse@tut.com)
Sent: Fri 2/22/08 3:19 AM
To: xxxx@hotmail.com

It's not that some people in your life are just mean- spirited, shortsighted, and ignorant, Ingenue, it's that they're grand, brilliant, and magnificent. Fellow adventurers who, at the peak of their glory, in worlds before this one, asked to dance with you in time and space, however briefly, so that they might learn a bit faster than otherwise.

And you know how you love healing. (OMG! Healing others to heal myself. AGAIN! I think the universe is trying to tell me something here.)

In the presence of greatness,
The Universe

This keeps happening! Every time, EVERY TIME, I pray for guidance I read or hear something unbearably appropos to my current dilemmas. Even w/o conscious prayer it happens 95% of the time I go to meetings. Invariably the speaker will deeply address whatever's been tormenting me for the day. No pre-meditation needed. Welcome to the wonders of living with a higher power.

I feel like I shouldn't be as awestruck as I am by all of these deeply spiritual comings and goings. After all, I've done some sort of yoga on and off for almost ten years! Also, in my early twenties I use to wear bindis over my third eye with no sense of irony whatsoever. Clearly I am openminded in regards to the spirit. Then again...

I'm doing my Second Step reading right now and there were three chapters (three chapters for one step! That ain't right) to get through, the final one being for the agnostics. Ah yes, the agnostics. That hopeless bunch who utterly rebel at the thought of needing a "spiritual solution" complete with the requisite "higher power" to recover from their alcoholism. Thank heavens I'm not one of those sorry bastards. Things are bad enough as they are. And yet. I'm a liar if I say I didn't identify. In fact the whole chapter is streaked with neon highlighter memorializing the points that hit home.

Even if I didn't self identify as an agnostic I was certainly living the life of one. And sometimes the hardest ego to crack is one that feeds off of a sense of pseudo-spirituality. The glamorous (and expensive) brand of spirituality; living as a raw foodist in Hawaii, doing barefoot yoga in Indian temples, paying someone hundreds of dollars to sort out the messy business of my locked up chakras-these things were how I wanted to express my spirit. You should have seen the look on my face when it became clear that my soul could only be recovered in dingy rooms sitting on folding chairs listening to homeless black men tell my story. And worse than that? My main job is to take people I despise in this life and do everything in my power to give them that which I have wanted for myself! How bad does that suck? Honestly.

But it remains the quickest and easiest way to enlightment. Even if I try to rebel my life sends me lessons from the divine to knock my punk ass back on track. Everytime I humble myself in these unthinkable ways, everytime I serve someone else's divine nature before my own, my own small petty problems evaporate. I mean they just disappear. It's really a bit freaky, but I'm learning to trust it.

Take for example my crusade to quit smoking. Being able to quit for my own health should be motivation enough, shouldn't it? You would think, but sadly, this is not so. Yesterday I spent the day looking up all of the harm my smoking does to the people, animals, and world around me. It ain't pretty. I cried looking at the animal torture that is conducted to prove WHAT WE ALREADY KNOW. Smoking kills people, so let's kill off millions of god's sweet animals JUST TO MAKE SURE that it's really that bad.

I prayed then and I pray now, God please give me the strength to be freed of this addiction. Please free me from addictions that rule my behavior and cause me to hurt my fellow men. If I can't personally help end all suffering at least guide my actions to keep me from doing harm. Do for me what I cannot do for myself.

This is day 2 of not smoking and 118 days of not drinking. Can't say I miss either one, really. Thank the cosmos for that, it's certainly none of my doing.....

Yours in Abject and Humble Devotion,
The Gratefully Dis-Illusioned Ingenue

And last but certainly not least....

2008-02-21T11:15:00.003-05:00

I QUIT SMOKING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Day 1. Hold ye tongues, naysayers. I'm in it to win it.

xoxox

Sweet Smelling Me

Crispy crackly outside, ooey gooey center...

2008-02-21T09:02:00.004-05:00

Yet again the eclipse let me have it. This one had a more peaceful pull, put everything got turned upside down, literally. That's right kids, I got into headstand in my yoga class. I didn't think I was ready to balance myself supported by nothing more than my forehead and forearms. But then again, when are you ever?

My day had not been the best. I had to go down to the new jobsite for an overwhelming meeting, I ate too many dark chocolate covered pretzels, but MOSTLY I was exhausted from scouring horoscopes all day long trying to decipher whether or not a Full Moon Lunar eclipse in Virgo in my fourth house meant that I was going to come home to an unexpected Eviction Notice. My fav monthly astrologer had insinuated as much (I think her words were be prepared to move) and considering the emotional and mental acrobatics I've gone through to keep a roof over my head, the thought of losing my flat after all that gave me some serious Fuck Its.

And so I have been dreading the 20th of February since I read February's Horoscope at the end of January. And after the Eclipse on the 6th? Fucking forget it. My whole life got ish-kibibbled at that lovely little junction of the sun, moon, and earth. And that was supposed to be the good one! The only thing that was left standing was my apartment, and then she tells me that the lunar eclipse is going to bring a MAJOR ending in my physical living space. Nobody gets how badly this stressed me out. No one has understood. You probably don't understand reading this now, and honestly, it isn't the point. The point is that I've been torturing myself needlessly for an imagined future disaster, that never happened. As the day came to an end, I found myself with a certain brand of restless anxiety that I've come to know all too well in sobriety. The moment my alcoholic mind started telling me not to go to Yoga Class I knew that was exactly where I need to be. So off I went.

It wasn't my prettiest yoga class. I was sweating sooo much I worried that perhaps my endocrine system had failed during the night and no one told me. Not to mention the fact that I had just come from work so the freshly showered smell that graced me in the morning had been replaced by a potpourri of stale cigarette smoke, concrete, and coffee breath. I washed my feet so most of the work boot scent was, thankfully, lifted. As my body heat rose, so did my aroma. I didn't dig it. I could smell myself and it was a rude awakening to the reality of me. Couple this with the actual yoga we were doing and I was feeling pretty wretched. I wobbled and fell repeatedly during the ball breaking standing series and had trouble telling my left from my right in the more quickly moving vinyasa moments. So by the time headstand rolled around, I was already admitting absolute defeat. This was not my class, this was not my time to stand on my head.

Which is no bother really. If you can't do a headstand you do a half-headstand which is kind of like a down dog with your forearms on the ground. So I was all kinds of ready to have a little rest in half-headstand when the ever vigilant teacher came around and decided today would be the day I went into headstand and she would not be leaving until I did. No excuses necessary, resistance is futile.

"Pull one knee up to your chest," she said. "This is not a good idea," the voices in my head replied.

"You have to trust in this. I'm not going anywhere," says she. "Anything could happen to me here! I could fall on my ass and take you with me! What happens if I queef really loudly and the whole class laughs at me? Do you have any idea what inversions can do to a girl's vadge?" shouted my voices. And yes, sadly, this is what my ego thinks of. I am what I am.

She stayed calm. She pulled me into it. I trusted. I let go. I let myself wobble. I TRIED. And eventually I did it. And it was amazing. She kept her hands on my legs holding me up until I slowly started to stabilize and then, like a parent taking off the training wheels, she moved her hands away. And of course I immediately started teetering violently. So she put her hands back. But for roughly 4.5 seconds, on a day when nothing made me feel confident or victorious, I did something I was convinced that I couldn't do. And it was humbling and amazing.

They say that Lunar Eclipses shine bright moon lights onto areas of your unconscious so you can change them for the better. I saw myself clearly in that yoga practice. I saw what needed to change. First and foremost any girl who willfully smokes 1/2 a pack of cigarettes a day and then complains that she doesn't smell nice is living in an unconscious stupor. Last time I checked one plus one still equals two, yeah? So last night I smoked my last cigarette. It's going to be demanding at times but it's doable. Just like my headstand. Whatever I have to go through to quit smoking is what I have to go through. Avoiding the nasty bits doesn't make life go away. And the longer I put it off is the longer I have to live just underneath my potential of health. So what to do?

I came face to face with my ego through this whole thing and I could see how it keeps sabotaging my soul's best efforts. Whenever something looks too hard, too difficult, too unfamiliar, I walk away from it. Or I try to compartmentalize it and define it so I can feel safer and more prepared walking into it. Life doesn't come with Cliff Notes! I committed to set my self aside in favor of spirit and that takes daily dedication and discipline. The nasty moments will make me grow so much faster than the happy moments. And eventually I'll get past the pendulum of pleasure and pain. Eventually I'll come to peace. One inelegant headstand at a time.

Your mat is a microcosm for your life. Work your shit out there first.

With all the love in the world,
Ingenue

Tell it like it is Yoga Journal...

2008-02-21T08:19:00.003-05:00

Asana Column: Salamba Sirsasana (Headstand)
Strengthen your musculoskeletal system, improve respiration, and stimulate digestion—all by standing on your head.
By John Schumacher

Almost all of the articles you see about yoga these days—and there are a passel of 'em—describe how wonderful it is. They list the benefits, ranging from increased flexibility to ultimate immersion in the Great Cosmic Ooze. They describe yoga as a stress-free, painless way to well-being. But by touting only the obvious goodies, these articles not only paint an incomplete picture of yoga, they also rob it of its juice. The pleasures and benefits of yoga are indeed numerous and profound, but the difficulties you encounter in your practice are at least as important.

Ancient yoga texts stress the importance of tapas—the fiery quality of discipline and determination. One way to produce fire is friction, and the resistances that arise as you practice often provide the spark that ignites the fires of transformation. That fire is fed and fanned by your practice as you roll out your mat day after day. Every part of your life, from the most mundane to the most lofty, also rolls out for your consideration. Every time you practice, you run the risk of having your world turned upside down.

But that's true whether you do yoga or not. At any moment, your life can change forever. Whether you choose to keep this frightening truth in the forefront of your awareness or not, impermanence is a fact of life.

Long ago, yogis recognized this by making nonattachment one of the cornerstones of yogic practice. If you follow the path of yoga, you must be willing to change anything and everything in your life: what you eat, wear, and read; how you perceive, think, and act. To be truly free, somewhere along the line you have to be willing to give up the illusory security of the known and fling yourself into the abyss of the unknown.

Salamba Sirsasana (Headstand) provides an opportunity for experimenting safely with the unfamiliar and the fear it engenders. Headstand can be scary. It literally turns your world upside down. Beginners may become disoriented, unable to tell left from right and top from bottom.
But, as B.K.S. Iyengar says in his section on Sirsasana in Light on Yoga (Schocken, 1995), "The best way to overcome fear is to face with equanimity the situation of which one is afraid." Fortunately, disorientation in Headstand subsides fairly quickly. With regular practice, you can begin to experience the benefits which led the yogis to call Sirsasana the "King of Asanas."

-Yoga Journal

My mission, should I choose to accept it....

2008-02-19T10:34:00.002-05:00

God, make me a channel of thy peace;
that where there is hatred, I may bring love;
that where there is wrong, I may bring the spirit of forgiveness;
that where there is discord, I may bring harmony;
that where there is error, I may bring truth;
that where there is doubt, I may bring faith;
that where there is despair, I may bring hope;
that where there are shadows, I may bring light;
that where there is sadness, I may bring joy.
God, grant that I may seek rather to comfort than to be comforted;
to understand, than to be understood;
to love, than to be loved.
For it is by self-forgetting that one finds.
It is by forgiving that one is forgiven.
It is by dying that one awakens to eternal life.
Amen.

How beautiful is that? So hard to embody but as the Full Moon Lunar eclipse in Virgo nears I feel called back to this beautiful and high truth. I spent the month scurrying around trying to find comfort, I shouted my beliefs at the top of my lungs trying to be understood, I demanded love without being able to give it freely myself. And that was totally what I needed to be doing. I'm a trial and error sort of girl and thankfully life seems to support me in that. It's not like I get one chance to learn these karmic lessons and then it's over. They get brought up again and again and again. Alcoholics are notoriously slow learners so this is a good thing.

I think my recent entry into a more charitable frame of mind is thanks to the classes I took at Jivamukti this weekend. Holy. Sweet. Jesus. My body is sore in places I didn't know I had, and my soul is singing. My heart chakra feels, well, open. Unstruck, as the yogi's say. My heart chakra has really been putting me through it of late. For those that haven't yet, meet your fourth (heart) chakra:

Issues of love, grief, hatred, anger, jealousy, fears of betrayal, of loneliness, as well as the ability to heal ourselves and others are centered in the fourth chakra. From this position in the middle of the body the fourth chakra is the balance between your body and spirit. This chakra is the place where unconditional love is centered. Unconditional Love is a creative and powerful energy that may guide and help us through the most difficult times. This energy is available in any moment, if we turn our attention to it and use it to free us from our limits and fears.

I've been re-reading through my blogs of the last month and nearly all of the work I've been doing as been fourth chakra work. So thank the Heavens, the Earth, and Everything in Between that I finally found a yoga practice that supports that. Jivamukti is the real deal my friends. Right now I have the one week unlimited trial and I want to go every day! After that I have two free class cards which should get me through the weekend and then after that, well, it'll get a little sticky. Let's just say enlightenment is not cheap in this setting. To be able to go four/five times a week will run me about 250 bucks a month. Hmmm.

I think the perfect solution for me will be one that allows a balance between my home practice and the classes. It's just that the classes are so damn good. I feel completely transcended when I walk out of there. I feel depth and gratitude, and most noticeably, gooey giggling uncontrollable and unconditional love. Love for subway seats, love for ex boyfriends, love for questionable haircuts. It's a new sensation and I don't think I'll spend too much time trying to define it, because I'm certain this is supposed to remain a mystery. I'm cool with that, I just want to go deeper into it, you know?

So all of this brings me right back to St. Francis's prayer for peace. I think this call to surrender myself in service is perfectly evocative of the transformation underway in me. I don't need to go anywhere, do anything, be anyone else, to serve. Every day my life gives me countless opportunites to get it. Serve. Understand. Accept.

Anyways, that may look like a bit of a ramble, but it all makes perfect sense in my head. I've been opened to a new consciousness is what I'm trying to tell you. It's lovely and welcome. Maybe I should have said that at the start, eh?

Yours in absolute Yogini bliss,
Ingenue

Yoga School says.....

2008-02-15T09:24:00.000-05:00

Ishvara PranidhanaThe Power of Surrender
"And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom." - Anais Nin
The word "yoga" can be used in two ways: as a noun, or as a verb. In the first instance, yoga refers to our natural state of being in which we no longer identify ourselves with the body and mind, but know ourselves to be the infinite, communal life force that is present within all beings, and all aspects of the universe. It is synonymous with the state of Enlightenment, Samadhi, or God Realization. In it's second use as a verb, the word yoga refers to those practices that will help us to reach this enlightened state of being. Through the goodness and grace of his heart, Sri Patanjali, the wise sage and yoga master, compiled for us the Yoga Sutras in which he expounds on not only the state of Yoga, but the powerful yoga practices that we can use to reach that state within this lifetime! In sutra 1.23, Patanjali gives us a sure-fire way to reach the state of yoga. It is a practice called ishvara pranidhana. Ishvara is a sanskrit word that can be translated to mean supreme, or personal, God. Pranidhana means to dedicate, devote, or surrender. The practice of Ishvara Pranidhana therefore means that if we are able to completely surrender our individual ego identities to God (our own higher self) we will attain the identity of God. If we can dedicate our lives to serving the God that dwells within all other beings, human and non-human alike, we will move beyond all feelings of separateness. If we can say without reservation, "I give You myself: my body, my mind and my heart, to do with as You best see fit," then we will be freed from the stress, anxiety, self-doubt and negative karma that arises from our reliance upon our egos to determine which actions we take in our lives. Ishvara pranidhana will help to cure the afflictions of the mind that cause pain and suffering, as it is designed to redirect our energy away from our selfish desires and personal dramas, and towards the ultimate pursuit of Oneness. So important and powerful is this practice, that Patanjali gives instructions for it on four separate occasions in the Yoga Sutras. And while it is the simplest and most direct method to attain yoga, it is not necessarily an easy practice, or even an attractive option to some. In our modern, western culture, where feelings of separateness and disconnection prevail, often times we pride ourselves on being strong and domineering over others. We are used to our egos calling the shots, and giving us the belief that we are somehow in control of the universe. Because of this, the idea of surrendering is taken to mean something negative, as it implies a sort of weakness, or defeat. An army, for example, might surrender to opposing forces, rendering the opposition the victor. In yoga, however, it is quite the opposite. Victory is attained as we willingly surrender our limited idea of who we are (i.e. our name, our jobs, our problems etc.) and create the space needed to feel our true nature of Self, which is one of limitless and boundless joy. It is like trading in a grain of sand and receiving the whole universe in return. And though it requires great self discipline, trust, and faith to practice ishvara pranidhana, ultimately it will take far more effort to cling to the smallness of the ego then it will to surrender the the higher self. Within a yoga class, there are many ways to practice ishvara pranidhana, and cultivate our ability and willingness to surrender. By continuously offering up our efforts and rewards to something more than just personal gain, we are able to keep ishvara (our own personal form of God) in the forefront of our minds. By putting aside our judgments and criticisms, and following the instructions given to us in class, we learn to more easily take cue from something other than the ego. With each forward bending posture, we bow down to God in some form that has meaning to us, and with each back-bending posture, we offer up our hearts, so that we may carry out the will of the universe with every thought, word and action we take. From this day forward, let us not waste away the moments of our lives consumed with smallness, jealousy, lust, greed and false notions of superiority. Contemplate daily the Supreme attributes of ishvara as you meditate and offer yourself completely as a vehicle for Divine Will. Peace comes when we relinquish the idea that we are the "doer" and allow the infinite to guide us on our way. Let go, and Let God.
- Sofi Dillof, February, 2008

I am in love, in love with the Divine.....

2008-02-14T12:13:00.003-05:00

The Nature of Divine Love

I say there is no human love. Human love, when it ceases, is not human! It's not even love! Only spiritual love exists. Place it where you may — on another human being and have a companion, a marriage if you wish, have children if you wish — but don't lose your Godhead in it.
Many a saint has gone through what is called the dark time of the soul. When despair came upon them in their hearts and they felt they were lost in the world of darkness, the saints kept their minds on the razor-edged path which leads to the goal of everlasting love and bliss. You do the same. You do the same.

Keep your mind on that goal of love. Let nothing cheat you of your love, kids. No matter what your relationship in this world. No matter what your life, your business life, your love life. Please don't be cheated of your Godhead in the midst of the world. Those seeking the world, when they come to that stage where there are disappointments, where there are despairs, they put a shield over their hearts and no longer have love flowing through. Their marriages and companionships and friendships and everything fall apart. They should not lose their love for their fellow beings. Haven't you all suffered in the night? I don't think there's one here — maybe a few, I don't know — who has not suffered through human relationships, suffered in the night, had sleepless nights, worried about losing someone, even if it be a member of the family. You can all understand what I am talking about.

-Hilda Charlton

Happy Universal Unabashed Love Day!!!!!!

2008-02-14T10:41:00.001-05:00

TUT... A Note from the Universe‏
From:
The Universe (light@tut.ccsend.com) on behalf of The Universe (theuniverse@tut.com)
Sent:
Thu 2/14/08 3:20 AM
Reply-to:
fun@tut.com
To:
xxxx@hotmail.com

Love where you've been. Love where you're at. Love how you think. Love the power you pack. Love all that you seek. Love all that you feel. Love your rocking emotions and the thoughts you make real.
But mostly, amazing Ingenue, I really, really love you in this very moment.
What?
Loving you from every angle - The Universe

Today's Trials

2008-02-13T07:58:00.003-05:00

2/13/08
Gemini Horoscope (May 21 - Jun 20)
You may think that time is running out, so you could get overly forceful in your search for happiness. But the greatest satisfaction may come from delving into the intensity of the uncomfortable places within your mind. Your tendency may be to avoid the darkness, yet this is where the treasures are hiding. Facing the unknown can catalyze the transformation of fear into love.

This is extremely good news right now, because I have dark places a-plenty swallowing me whole. I nearly relapsed last night, because I didn't pay attention to my higher power and I decided to engage in a conversation with someone who I knew I shouldn't be talking to, period. It brought me nothing but a serious case of the Crazies followed by a life threatening diagnosis of the Fuck Its. But as GSBF talked me back from the ledge (I was about to chug a beer the Weenie previously known as A had left in my refrigerator) I realized that I was going to have to dig deep into the pain right now if I have any hope of staying sober at all. GSBF told me last night that my Inner Alcoholic is dying right now, it's being killed off. And it will do anything to stay alive, like leading me away from my program and into the bed of an angry man. So I have nothing but unknown right now and if looking inward can take me out of this fear and back into my blissful loving state, count me in.

Gemini
For February 13: You are a truth detector today. No matter how cleverly another disguises his or her true motives, you see through the entire thing. You're sophisticated enough to know that this person doesn't want to admit the truth, so you play along but stop short of allowing him or her to harm you in any way. The word 'delusional' comes to mind. You may classify the person in question as delusional - and you're probably right in your assessment. When you're not tiptoeing around another grandiose fantasies that make absolutely no sense, you're privately thinking about a trip you'd love to take - a bona fide escape from your usual routine and stress.

This is true also. I know he's full of shit but I always knew that, really. I just chose to willfully ignore that fact because I wanted to be self-destructive. I need to get more interested in my own abyss and why I keep gravitating towards these misanthropic bastards when things start getting too good in my own life. But honestly, right now I can't fuck around with all the ways the Weenie is fucked up. And that man is fucked six ways from Sunday, but I nearly drank last night. So I'm not doing so hot myself. I need to pray my ass off to make it through all this is one sober piece, because right now I'm scared. Really, really scared.

Happy Valentine Daze, Gemini! During my search for the spark that would be most likely to energize your love life, I found this dose of truth from novelist Tom Robbins: "We waste time looking for the perfect lover, instead of creating the perfect love." I hope that quote inspires you to shed any tendency you might have to wait for the ideal romantic situation to find its way to you. Instead, establish a habit of visualizing in precise detail the kind of love you want to give and receive. Then work on patiently materializing it.

THANK YOU. Seriously, thank you. I agree whole heartedly. And while I'm sorting out the mental wreckage left over from this disastrous coupling, I'll work to keep my heart open with the knowledge of the kind of love I'm capable of. Love that has nothing do with sex, control, or being a punching bag for some sad old man's repressed anger. Self directed, Self possessed, Self Released LOVE.

More than anything I have to find a balance between keeping going and sitting with these scary emotions before they turn into my own repressed anger (and I really don't want to become a female version of the Weenie). Better to feel unstable, crazy, and emotional now and honestly get my recovery on then try and pretend I have it all figured out and end up a basket case, relapsing Girlfriend to another Weenie. I'd rather break this pattern. I'd rather be me. I'd rather be imperfect, erratic, unstable, and LOVED little old me.

Pray for me everyone (Especially you Johno, I like the way your soul works) and don't let me get away with pretending I don't need the help. I DO. I really do.

Marching Onward and Upward through my fear,
Ingenue

October 27, 2008

2008-02-12T08:34:00.000-05:00

10/27/07, 10/27/07, 10/27/07

Must remember my sobriety date! Everyone else seems to have there's tatooed on the brain and I just had to do long division to decipher mine. So now I am burning it into my memory, so I can have it handy should anyone ask.

10/27/07, 10/27/07, 10/27/07

I finally have a weekend to my self!

2008-02-08T11:46:00.000-05:00

And it's cost me dearly, but I frankly don't care at this point. I have a huge, repeat, HUGE week next week and all I want is time to be self-indulgent, space to be reflective, and good company surrounding me while I let my hair down. I have been far too hard on myself for the past few months and now that I have this new post-eclipse space in my life, I am going to Breathe, Celebrate, and Prepare.

The big things brewing next week are (in no particular order):

Final interview w/Senior Managment to discuss the new position (and new pay, yeah baby!)
Tibetan House Carnegie Hall Concert Volunteer Meeting (Tuesday)

Tibetan House Carnegie Hall Concert, itself (Wednesday)

The Red Party: Sweet Love Hangover a wonderful fundraiser for Big Apple Roundup

Touring the new Job Site and seeing just how terrible this open air, outside hoist is going to be.

It's a big week. And I have alot of personal cleansing that's overdue as well so I'm trying to remind myself to slow down. It doesn't all have to be figured out and finished right this minute. I do plan of getting my hair done (upstairs and downstairs lol), taking classes at Prana Power Yoga (I need the heat and the spiritual community), shopping for new work clothes and a new dress or five, and lunching with a collection of the loved ones I've been neglecting during the last two months. And meetings! How could I have forgotten the meetings? :)

But it's all flexible. I could take or leave any part of that schedule, it's completely up to me. That's really the most important part, being able to identify and attend to my own needs w/o getting guilt tripped over it. So in reality I'll probably do half of that and spend the rest of my time meditating and eating lots of homemade vegan food.

Which leads me kind of off-topic but I feel it's worth mentioning. I am so tired of eating restaurant vegan food! It's so overpriced, it never tastes as good as what I would make, and I have no control over the ingredients. I can't be sure things are organic, clean, you know. Lately I've been crazy into lentils (always yummy and easy to make extras for lunch) and as always GREEN FLIPPING SMOOTHIES!

I've found that my natural way of eating is really simple, really clean, and fairly inexpensive. I like green smoothies, fresh coconut anything, and a handful of tasty vegan gourmet cooked dishes. Easy Peasy. Throw in plentiful amounts of fresh fruits and veggies and a wee amount of soy and you have my daily nosh. The only time things get complicated is when I try to get everything from restaurants. Food for thought, no?

In conclusion: TGIF. Seriously. I am so appreciative of the R & R. Don't expect any word from me until Monday morning, my loves! I shall be luxuriating....

*muah*

You-know-who

GREAT GOOGLY MOOGLY........

2008-02-07T08:28:00.000-05:00

Dear, sweet Jeebus, did the new moon solar eclipse let me have it yesterday. The entire context of my life changed. Just about every major arena I'm playing in was affected. This morning I'm not even playing the same sport I was playing yesterday. I'm in a whole new league now...

Blow by blow:

Yesterday morning I woke up with more restless rage in me than you could shake a stick at. I had a burning desire to kick puppies, scare small children, and engage in some epic self-mutiliation. This was at 4:30 in the morning, mind you. I made myself some coffee (fairly unnecessary as I was already amped to the heavens) and hit my yoga mat. I managed about 15 minutes of asana before the alien rage beast that was inhabiting my body pulled me out of my practice. I manically paced around my bathroom straightening my hair and fussing over my makeup. Eventually I got on a train and headed into work. The anger hadn't really subsided it just transmuted into this raw, visceral anxiety. Something big was coming, it had to come, something had to change, and my spiritual recognition of this just about unglued me.

I'd love to say my day of living my life as one Giant Exposed Nerve got better, but sadly, it did not. Not until well into the nighttime anyways. The pressure got so bad that around noon I had to make an emergency sobbing phone call to GSBF. I was having recurring fantasies of storming out of the office with both my middle fingers defiantly raised. I was on the verge of nervous collapse because my male co-workers had mocked my vegan lunch choices. In short, the level of emotion I was experiencing was not at all proportionate to the stimuli.

After GSBF had talked me back from the edge I started frantically issuing a series of foxhole prayers to the Almighty. They went something like, "Please God, please, please, please just show me what you want me to do! I feel like a stranger in my own life, I don't fit here anymore, show me where you want me to go! Whatever you want, I'll do it, just take me out of this indecision, please." And wouldn't you know it? My prayers were answered within the hour. You know how they say be careful what you wish for? Well, they ain't lying.

I came back into the office somewhat recovered only to be pulled outside by The Boss. He wanted to keep it short and sweet. He thought it was time for me to move to a new job site, a HUGE job site, a scary job site. A job site where I could really make a name for myself in this topsy turvy world of construction. And you have to decide THIS WEEK and be ready to leave BY THE NEXT, you can handle that Ingenue, can't you?

And there it was. I love my co-workers and they've been good to me, but I'm stagnating on this site. Now that I'm sober there's been no way for me to escape from the realization that something is off with my career path right now. This was the perfect solution. Upward mobility within the same company. No drastic alteration, just progression.

Having said all that, it still scared the holy shit out of me. The anxiety that had been torturing me all day picked up speed and like a swarm of bees gathering together to attack, my Tension swooped in for the kill. My head popped and the only thought I was capable of realizing was, "I. Am. Going. To. Drink."

I wanted everything to slow down, I wanted a guarantee, I wanted some comfort dammit! And the only guarantee I have in my life is what happens when I drink. Everything turns to caca. Nasty, but true and unchanging.

I didn't drink. I hauled my shaking ass to a meeting and held on to my folding chair with both hands. I sat through my fear, my anxiety, my character flaws. I shared about them, I exposed them to the lights, I accepted them, and they dissolved. The whole group of us seemed to be going through similar sorts of emotional displacement (THANK YOU ECLIPSE) and the healing underway in that room was palpable. I was so grateful to be there, I was so grateful to be me, I didn't want to hide from my life anymore. I made it through to the other side and left with peace and strength that were every bit as powerful as my rage and anxiety had been in the morning.

So, here I am, pruning the dead weight from my life. It's painful and scary sometimes, but so rewarding. The reward? Getting to be me, obviously! Getting to live surrounded by this much love and support, finding the strength inside me to things I never would have dreamed of doing a year ago. This time in my life, like everything else, is beautiful and temporary. It won't be here forever, I need to savor it while it's available. I am not going to let fear drag me away from my precious experience.....and for that, Thank You Eclipse! I appreciate it more than you know....

Nothing but love,
Ingenue

Bring it!

2008-02-05T14:00:00.000-05:00

It's eclipse time! A new moon solar eclipse no less. Which means: Big Change and New Beginnings are a-coming for us all. Let's have a look at what the mighty Yasmin Boland has to say about this, shall we?

Weekly Gemini Horoscope - Week of 4th February, 2008

This week brings a New Moon eclipse - on Thursday.

NEW MOON ECLIPSE ECLIPSE IN YOUR 9TH HOUSE - YOUR TRAVEL AND STUDY ZONE
WHAT IT MEANS: It's all about ... adventure, travel and personal development
MOON MEDITATION: Life's an adventure and I love it so this month, l'll ... (fill in the blank)
The part of your chart being lit up by the New Moon eclipse is ruled by Jupiter-the planet of expansion. So whether you're expanding your mind by studying or travel, by talking to well-travelled people or through doing a personal development course, you have the chance now to broaden your horizons. This cycle is also about your faith and beliefs. If you know you've been rigid, perhaps clinging on to what you were taught as a child rather than forming your own opinions, someone could come along now and help or force you to rethink your philosophies. This is also a great time to break out of routines and to get a little more freedom.

New Moon eclipse Ritual: Open an atlas, close your eyes, pick a country blind and then read up on it on the Internet
THINGS TO DO THIS MONTH
* Plan an overseas trip * Read those books you know you should * Do a personal development course * Fall in love with a foreigner * Think about what you have faith in-and what you don't * Make a cyber pal on the other side of the world * Have something you've written published

http://www.moonology.com/

You don't have to ask me twice, Yasmin! The cosmic tides have swept me up already and my wanderlust is at Defcon 5. Not only am I spending inordinate amounts of time questioning where my dogma hides (it's in my diet if you're interested) but my thirst for new meditation techniques, archaic buddhist sutras, and general exotic loveliness is unquenchable right now. And have my writing published? I'm way ahead of you chic! Trust. Yours truly is in it to win it.....

Yeah Mama!

The Amazingly Incredible Ingen-ious One

Well hello there!

2008-01-31T12:32:00.000-05:00

Long time no speak, eh? I've had plenty to say yet no real concrete way to say it lately. My life experience has been exceeding my current vocabulary (which is saying A LOT. My grammar may be shit, but my lexicon is above reproach).

Let's see, what is going on with me? Hmmm. Well I'm no longer counting days. I hit my 90 and I am now officially a qualifying alcoholic. I qualified for the first time on my 90th day at my home group meeting, which was also being chaired by GSBF! How perfect is that? Well for me, that's really the only word. Perfect. It was w/o flaw. One of the most amazing things that I've ever done and again, the words to do it justice are simply escaping me.

I look around and I cannot believe the life I'm living right now! I am surrounded by some of the most amazing souls you could imagine. Hilarious, ferociously loving, enlightened beings who simultaneously push me higher into trancendence while grounding me in my delightful present. (Told you I had the lexicon, WHAT?!?!). I come to work and my most beloved boss (hereafter referred to as The Boss) breaks my balls and then makes me laugh uncontrollably. I go upstairs to pick up a green smoothie from Elixir and comment on my juicer girl's Tibetan tattoos. Smiles and yummy raw foods all around. I go to my meeting after work to mix, mingle, and recover with GSBF and the BabyGirl and the Oldtimers and the ex-junkie fashionistas, and let us never forget the reformed rent boys. I look around and think, "Who knew my alcoholism would lead me here?" I feel lucky and blessed. And then I go home and call up A and pinch myself to think this amazing man is all mine. An hour or so of spiritual philosophy peppered with phone sex later, I'm off my celly and into my bed.

This is the life. It's the good shit. What I always dreamt was possible. So why do I feel lingering hints of depression, just waiting to eat my ass up? Easy answer. Even though my external life is glowing, my internal self needs all of the care, attention, love, and focus I can spare right now. So it's a good thing A's been so into Happy Yoga lately, because his unknowing intervention just saved my booty.

In Happy Yoga, Steve Ross has little "Reccommended Supplements" sections at the end of each chapter. In one of these sections he gives a major shout out to SAMe, an amino acid known to serve as a potent anti-depressant. I don't think I've mentioned this before but my lover is a supplement junkie. Seriously, the boy is a big time pill popper. He pops L-Glutamine instead of valium but it's still funny to watch him guzzle handfuls of vitamins. So the SAMe deal was right up A's alley and on the next weekend we were out he got some. Two bottles for him and one for me. Thinking that my moods could definitely use a boost (like anybody's right?) I started taking them. Whoa. Whoahhh. What the...?

Within three days I felt the most bizarre shift in mind state I've ever had. Now I have no real experience with SSRI's so I couldn't give you a comparison. What I do know is this: I had been battling the blues for no real reason and all of the sudden, I wasn't anymore. It was just lifted from my mind. It wasn't until my mental had elevated that I realized that I was struggling a lot more that I had previously thought.

But isn't that always how depression works? You think the lethargy will pass, you discount the difficulty you have getting out of bed. You don't want to shower and take care of yourself, but you try to put it out of your head. Before the big bad D-word occurs to you, you're more likely to convince yourself that you are inherently lazy. A creature of sloth and low will power, if you will.

But now, I am reformed. I'm happy to have the help and everything in my life is benefitting from it. My appetite has normalized (I'm an outrageous emotional eater), my anxiety is WAY down, and my appreciation for all that is? It's on the rise. I can deal with life's little nasties now and I can revel in it's pleasures. Of course no pill, chemical or otherwise can heal you on it's own. But I was doing everything else I could think of to combat my depression. So now, I will gladly accept the help. I'm going to keep doing the work all by my onesie and let the revolution roll.....

Happy, Happy, Well.

Ing-e-nue

Well I'll be damned!

2008-01-28T10:10:00.000-05:00

It's come and gone, just like that. I, my dear friends, made my 90 days. I am no longer counting days. I am well esconced in my recovery. 90 days is a pretty big hallmark for a drunk. It's your first sober anniversary to begin with. It also marks the time after which an AA can begin qualifying in meetings. On my "official" 90th day, I qualified at my sponsor's meeting and it was lifechanging. I have no earthly idea what I said, lol. It all kind of poured out of me in one great, heartfelt rush. I do know that whatever I had planned to say vacated my mind as I sat there to share. I spent alot more time than I thought I would talking about my childhood and adolescence. I'm glad I did, I feel lighter now.

One thing that really surprised me is that I discussed my rape. Just to get it out of the way, when I was 15 I was walking home drunk from a bar (where I had no business being in the first place) when two guys that had been at the bar drove up alongside me and offered me a ride. I declined, they insisted, I got in the car, I was raped. I can barely remember the months that followed to tell you the truth, I was in a complete psychic blackout. I don't know how I survived that, as young as I was. I don't know how I managed to keep quiet about it, big as my mouth is. Big as my pain was, I'll never know how I managed to keep going. What I do know is that my addictions were off to the races after that event. At the tender age of 15, I had discovered my one true calling in this life: complete and utter self-annihilation.

I hadn't meant to discuss my rape but I am so incredibly glad I did. After my qualification no less than four other women shared about their own sexual traumas and even the men in the room had identified. Can you say majorly healing? I've never experienced something like that before, it's changed me to the core.

What's funny is that in all of that sharing the one thing I didn't really talk about is my drinking! It honestly slipped my mind, I talked about everything else under the sun and luckily the room was wonderfully indulgent in this regard. They've been through this before. I am not the only newbie who felt the need to show off battle scars in their first qualification. However, wiser woman than myself promised me that this will pass and with time I will be able to qualify about my alcoholism w/o all the sentimentality.

With all the gratitude in the world for my amazing home group,
Ingenue

I accept your challenge....

2008-01-23T08:18:00.000-05:00

Gemini Horoscope for week of January 24, 2008
If you have trouble resisting the urge to stay current with news about famous actresses, you may have a mental illness. A team of psychologists has certified "Celebrity Worship Syndrome" as an actual psychiatric condition. Now please listen to me closely: It is imperative that you stifle this malady during the next 25 days, even if you have a mild case of it. Your fantasy life needs to soar into unknown frontiers where more of the details of your own personal talents will be revealed, and you can't afford to be weighed down with fantasies about rich and charismatic people you don't know.

Oh this is me. I am a compulsive PerezHilton.com consumer, and don't even get me started on Dlisted.com. These sites makes me feel like a dirty little somthing and yet I can't seem to stay away! Funny, when I was taking my mental inventory this morning of behaviors I need to adopt to reach enlightenment, this one didn't even cross my radar. But it fits and so I will.

I, Ingenue, do solemnly swear, to purge myself of celebrity gossip outlets for the next 25 days. One day at a time, I shall give myself this extra spiritual space to see what the Divine wants to fill it with. Amen, Godspeed, Namaste, all that jazz.....

xoxoxo Me

Sigh...

2008-01-22T14:52:00.000-05:00

This was in my inbox this morning....

Psssssst... Not that you ever would, Ingenue, but when someone tells their best friend about their difficult day, or how tricky relationships have been, or that they have a jolly good life in most regards except financially, not only do they relive the unpleasantness, but they commission all the elements to project into their future whatever they've been claiming. Besides, you'd never say, "jolly."
Better to whisper sweet nothings - The Universe

I understand Universe. Believe me I do. I've been trying very hard, very hard not to bitch and moan today and so far I've been succeeding. I've been bravely sitting here, alone with my menstrual cramps, sober as a judge, and cheerfully silent.

WHAT THE ALMIGHTY FUCK IS THE MATTER WITH THE MEN I WORK WITH?!?!?! I don't think I'm the only woman in the world who wants a little bit of serenity in her work environment. And given the ominous time of the month we find ourselves in, YOU WOULD THINK THEY VALUE THEIR LIVES A LITTLE MORE THAN THAT. Why would they want to make me crazy? What the hell are they playing at? This is one wisecrack away from becoming a BLOODBATH. No pun intended. Eeeeeew. I just grossed myself out.

In case you hadn't noticed my hormones are owning me at the moment. I feel altered, distorted, amped, and somehow muted all at once. I don't have any practical reason to be whiny, but my emotions are finding fault with everything on God's green earth right now.

Also I'm realizing that although I only have like 87 days sober, I've managed to have 4 periods in my sobriety. Not freaking cool! I must have been half crazed by the lethal hangover/hormone combination when I dragged my ass into Perry Street for the first time. If only I knew then how unfortunate my sense of timing would be, I'd have kept drinking for another week. 4 x 28 days is....why the bleep is this happening to me?

It's not that horrible, I know . I mean, I'm not over here surviving endometriosis or anything. Fine, invalidate my pain, see if I care! You can suck it, naysayers, because I am here to tell you, sober menstruation can sit and spin. This shit blows pureed broccoli chunks and I will scream it from the heavens. It'd be one thing if I could tuck myself away in meetings and zen meditation, gliding back and forth between my yoga mat and my lavender scented bed. Instead I find myself trapped on a construction site with testosterone juiced men jumping around and my defenses are weak! I can't even steel my nerves with a vodka or six! I am in recovery damn you! DAMN YOUSE ALL TO HECK!

I just, I can't. I just can't. My pms bitchy vibes are scaring everyone off and I am in turn recoiling from the preemptive rejection I keep encountering. I am sensitive, I am bloated, and I am not even allowed to take Midol (wouldn't want to if I could, trying to keep au natural, aren't I?). I want to go home and hide under my covers and cry. In fact, after I go to my 6:00 meeting and share about wanting to go home crawl under my covers and cry, I think I'll do exactly that. Maybe some sort of a sobbing candle lit yoga practice. I don't know. I feel beastly, oogly, unwanted, and all manners of downtrodden.

Three more days, (DEAR GOD) only three more days. Sigh.

Yours in perpetual abdominal soreness,
Ingenue

You've got to give it away to keep it....

2008-01-21T14:27:00.000-05:00

Apparently my BF lived a past life (or three) as a Yogic Master. I know this because yesterday I went through a yoga practice with him and for someone experiencing yogi karma for the first time he sure seemed to know what's up. I've been totally obsessed with the idea of getting A into yoga since I first met him. This is mostly because I think all hot men should be required to practice yoga religiously. This is to balance out the yoga studio populations. It's all hot yogini chickadees and unappealing large, sweaty, and hairy guys. I feel a compulsion to do everything I can to redress this situation.

Anyhow, yesterday A dove right into a 30 minute Baron Baptiste routine and I was there to help. I am certainly NOT a yoga instructor but I've been instructed and surprisingly it is a fairly intuitive thing to guide another body through a series. Maybe it's easier if you've been engaging in lots of marathon style lovemaking with the person in question, I really don't know. What I do know is this: that 30 minutes of doing yoga with A was one of the most expansive, intimate experiences I have ever had. It was unbelievable. It was beyond the beyonds. I hope it was as good for him as it was for me.

I don't know if I've mentioned it or not yet but my baby has an unreal body. Tall, broad shouldered, lean hipped, and built like a Greek god; A is every woman's first fantasy man. You know how nice guys always complain that we ladies screw them over for the bad boys? And you know how we can never really defend ourselves because it's kind of true? And you know how at some point we identify that all we really want is someone who looks like a motorcycle riding rebel but has a golden heart and saves kittens from fires and such? That's him! That's A! And he has a Brooklyn accent. How hot is that? Seriously.

So seeing my tattooed, perfectly muscled, and shirtless boyfriend get his vinyasa on for the first time was nothing short of thrilling for me. I thought he might be a little, ahem, hesitant. I was so wrong, his body instinctively moved all the right ways. Now and then I'd lift up a stray arm to move him into a commanding Warrior 2. My favorite was holding his arms over his head as he stretched into his first Lunging Backbend. I could feel the power coming off of him and it was amazing. By that point it was no big shocker tho, I knew all bets were off when 5 minutes into the practice A got up into Crow Pose and held it for 90 seconds with no complaint! WTF?!?!? Three years it's taken me to do that and I still wobble.

It was so good. It was a beautiful thing to witness. It was a priceless moment to share and it wouldn't have happened with just anyone. This is the kind of energy that exists between the two of us and it's somehow healing and intoxicating at the same time. It isn't always easy but when is it ever? Feeling so comfortable and elevated alone with A in our yoga-gasm brought into sharp relief exactly how conflicted I've been about this relationship.

I take alot of grief in my AA group about dating this early. In case you weren't aware if you're single when you first get sober prevailing recovery wisdom wants you to stay single for a long time. Like, at least a year, long time. I don't even have 90 days sober yet and I met A about two months ago. We've been dating for six weeks. These are not the types of things you tell AA old timers w/o expecting to catch some serious flack. And while they are certainly not wrong about how dangerous dating can be for a newly recovered alchie, I'm starting to know that I'm not wrong about A. My sobriety is first and foremost, it will always have to be. If I'm not sober I don't get to keep A, I don't get to keep my yoga, I don't get to keep any of the love or grace I've recovered. If I'm not sober I get more darkness, more black-outs, more suffering. I totally know this and I'm profoundly grateful for the self-knowledge.

I also know that what's happening between me and A doesn't happen that often in a lifetime because I've never experienced it before. Past that? Men like A don't exist in large numbers yet and if they do they ARE NOT going to be found in Manhattan. There is a serious drought of conscious, masculine, loving, visionary beings out here. A isn't like any man I've ever met before and I know that I'm an important part of his story right now. He's got so much to give this world. Just being himself day in, day out; he changes everything. And I don't want to freaking apologize for the fact I've fallen in love anymore! With a man like this, how could I not? Honestly, how long was I supposed to hold out?

He's a vegetarian, he's getting his yoga fix, he loves me, and he's a freaking genius in bed. And I am sober. I'm doing all of this SOBER! I can feel every feeling, good and bad. When we make love I feel every insecurity and every orgasmic shudder like it's happening in technicolor. This is my life and this is how I want to live it. So grateful.....

Of course A and I may not work out, who ever got a guarantee on a New Love? The point is, I would regret it forever if I didn't follow my heart into this man's arms. Some things you can chicken out of, but not this. So I'm sure you'll understand if I politely refuse any well-meaning worry. Please don't take it personally, it's me. Not you! I know it's coming from a loving place but I really do need to follow my own counsel on this one. If you ever have the pleasure of seeing A doing sun salutes in nothing but his sweat pants, you'll get it. Believe me, you'll get it.

Bursting in love, joy, and absolute bliss-
Me

Dear Ingenue,

2008-01-17T10:42:00.000-05:00

Ingenue, honey, we need to talk. I'm worried about your well being right now and past experience has shown me that you will not contact me in your time of need. So. I'm reaching out. I hope these words don't fall on deaf ears or a closed heart. Can I just start by saying how proud I am of you? You've really gone above and beyond the call of duty on this path to wellness. You're exploring yourself, you're opening up, you're dealing with really painful deeply lodged stuff, and staying sober through it. Wow. Are you amazed? I'm not, I knew you had it in you. I knew at some point in your life you'd come find me and once we were reunited sobriety was going to be a totally happy thing for you.

I understand why you were drinking so much and keeping us separated Baby. I understand it better than you know and I'm not even a little upset with you. You're exactly where you need to be NOW and you are entirely perfect just as you ARE. Please tell me you heard that. Perfect, now. The old emotions that are coming up, the old hurts, they don't really exist anymore but the more you try and push them down, the more energy they get to terrorize you. Just let 'em up! I promise you, we'll get through to the other side. The ease, the happiness, and the peace you've felt over the last ninety days? That's just a small taste of the bliss we could have together. Trust in me. Dive in to the deep end, and I promise you'll thank me for it...

Because it can't be said enough, good work. I'm so proud of you.

Yours truly,
Self

Slow News Day...

2008-01-16T12:42:00.000-05:00

So I bring you my latest obsession:

KELP NOODLES!

Yum Diddly-Freaking Scrumptious.

Completely Raw, Totally Natural.

No real fishy flavor, in fact not very much flavor at all.......

Noodley and Pasta-y in those moments when you need it....

They make an AMAZING noodle base for Sesame Noodles.

Completely stacked with hard to find minerals (in the manner of all sea vegetables).

Who could ask for anything more? Seriously.
Ingenue

Hell yes! GSBF to the rescue!

2008-01-15T11:12:00.000-05:00

I love this boy and there's a good reason. I share with you: Pearls of Wisdom From The Mighty Mouth of GSBF.

-----------------From: Ingenue Date: Jan 15, 2008 7:31 AM
Darlingest,
If you can I need to chatter via email. My spiritual resolve of yesteryear seems to have been swallowed up by relationship mother-fuckery. A and I are in a nasty place right now and on top of that something weird is going on at work. My work email was deleted which makes me think I've been fired and someone's going to drop the bomb any second now. I can't text back and forth, but I can definitely hold on until tonight's meeting if you can't engage in email counseling. I promised to practice radical acceptance so I guess this is my chance to keep my word.
Love you,
Me

----------------- Reply -----------------From: GSBF Date: Jan 15, 2008 11:17 AM
Ahh grasshopper-
you are mind identifying!
Don't pick up that first think!
Remember you are not your mind!

I wouldn't jump to any conclusions, mamma, about work.There is something astrologically going on with tech stuff..bet mercury is going retrograde.. having major tech issues especially with email the past 24 hours.Remember our wants are never satisfied but our needs are always met. I gotta get something to eat.. I'm H.A.L.T.ing pretty hard myself right now. Feel free to give me a ring during a break.

Love ya!

About the relationship-ville, put it on the shelf and you can deal with it later when you see him.

-GSBF

So simple, so true, so useful. What would I do without that boy?

Nobody's perfect, right?

2008-01-15T09:02:00.001-05:00

This life is so relentlessly perfect. There are no mistakes. Ever. Last night I heard someone say. "Coincidences are God's way of remaining anonymous" and that's true too. Every precious little thing that happens is part of a larger plan. The endgame is enlightenment. The comings and goings of day to day existence are all vehicles to get you there. To that extent, nothing can ever be judged "good" or "bad" because it's all the same. It's all God trying to reveal itself to you. And if nothing can ever be bad than there is never a reason to panic, worry, or freak out. It's all perfect! It's exactly what you need when you need it.

Having said all that, on Sunday night I freaked the fuck out. I think it might have been building up in me but it's hard to pinpoint. Suffice it to say on Sunday night it was unwittingly revealed to me that I was in the same household as an herbal (and illegal) substance that isn't necessarily an addiction for me but remains on the no-no list. Nobody was smoking it, it wasn't in plain sight, and no one would have dreamt of offering it to me. Still, just the knowledge I was trapped, TRAPPED!, in the same house as something I wanted but couldn't have sent me spiralling. I lost my shit. I started frantically pacing back and forth collecting all of my belongings. My mind was racing as I dreamed up ways to beat a hasty retreat and get the hell up out of there. And my body, dear god, my body. I was consumed with such visceral, physical longing that I actually started to tear up with the ache. A was on hand to witness the whole event and couldn't understand what was going on. I wasn't really in the place to explain it to him either. All I could do is silently cry and shake until my words came back to me. But even then, my explanations were pretty feeble seeing as I didn't fully understand this turn of events myself.

Eventually I calmed down and made it home sober and in one piece. I couldn't stop thinking about what had just happened. It shook me to the core to know that my disease was that freaking close to me. I've been doing so well! I'm in a functional relationship, I blow dry my hair every morning. I do yoga and I wax poetic on my brand new blog. Why the hell would the thought of a bong toke that didn't even exist reduce me to that sort of junkie scrambling?

The answers were quick and certain to the questions I asked. How many meetings did you go to this week? 2 and 1/2. What priority level is your sobriety at right now? Neck and neck with total enlightenment yet sadly just underneath fitting into my 29" waist jeans. Do you really have to ask the question? No. Do you you know why you were freaking out? Yup.

I've known this was coming. I've been seeing it strolling up to me a long way off but I didn't heed my Higher Self's warning. I let my guard down, I slipped into my natural semi-conscious state. And then my disease let me have it. Which really was, the perfect thing to have happened.

I woke up Monday morning with new resolve and clarity. I did my yoga and my mind was quiet. My body was burning, but my head didn't even try to fight it. Nothing else that day went according to plan. The internet connection in my office was down so we were all dead in the water. My co-horts were reading papers and sighing in their boredom. I pulled out Happy Yoga and started highlighting all the point I found relevant in that moment. Pretty soon everyone else had vacated to greener pastures and I was alone in the office. Suddenly I knew I had to something I really didn't want to do. Something I had been avoiding since I got sober. I had to 9th step my divorce attorney who hasn't been paid since he took the case. I had to call him and make direct amends for my transgressions. Even though a vortex of willingness had opened up in me I was still panicked by the thought. I did not want to hear whatever he had to tell me about myself. But I knew I had to hear it.

It went better than I expected! I dealt with it. I apologized and told him honestly that I had been in recovery and was still trying to put all the financial pieces back together after my boozy spending past. He told me that he would finish my case with no prejudice, we could work out the money later, and I was not a horrible deviant person.

Afterwards I felt a peace I don't think I have EVER experienced before in my life. It lasted all day long. I went to two meeting, I shared about my findings, I soaked up the wisdom and love around me. 'Twas truly a lovely, luscious day.

Cut to this morning when I am pretty much returned to my normal state of anxiety. Something weird is going on with A and I and it's not fun. My work email has been accidentally deleted which has of course convinced me that I've been fired and nobody let me know. My ego is desperately trying to convince me to buy into it's shenanigans. But I know what I felt yesterday and I know it was true. There's a part of me that isn't affected by any of this. There's a part of me that's gorgeous and still, beautiful and unchanging. I just can't find it right now because my mind is distracting me. But if I let all of this be EXACTLY as it is, it too shall pass. And after all of that foolishness, there I'll be.

See? Perfect.
Ingenue

The best laid plans...

2008-01-11T12:07:00.000-05:00

Why, why is it so hard for me to surrender my will? I might as well be asking why I was born a Gemini instead of a mountain goat. I get the idea that this is the main struggle of every one in life. I'm starting to think this is why the Bible makes such a big deal out of the whole GOD gave MAN free will part. God gave us free will so we could choose to freely give it back. "No thanks Big Guy! I'd much rather you make the decisions. It's so messy deciding for myself!"

I'm a funny girl but it's kind of the case. When I was left at the mercy of my will I was a sniveling, alcoholic mess who was becoming well acquainted with death-defying blackouts. My choices were questionable at best. And even worse they didn't even feel like my choices. It felt like some alien being was puppeteering me, pulling my strings to make me hurt myself. With no conscious effort from me. Which is exactly what was happening, really. I was deeply unconscious and my pain body was tossing me around. That was so deep of me! Holy hell, I should get 35 gold stars for making that connection. Anywho...

In Dry, A Memoir Augusten Burroughs wrote something that stuck with me even before I got sober. It went along the lines of: If something feels safe, warm, and comfortable it's probably the Alcoholic choice. If it feels terrifying, unnerving, and completely unlike you it's the first Healthy choice you've ever made. I am trying to live by this doctrine right now because, well, it works. What I want, what I am attracted to, what my ego craves all of that equals self annihilation. So when there's something I really WANT to do, I try and do the opposite.

I'm not always successful. Sometimes, okay most of the time, I just click along satisfying myself out of habit. But there are a few areas where I've been able to reset my desires and I'm proud of that.

1. Chugging Green Smoothies like they're going out of style. This one was actually quite easy, seeing as Green Smoothies are nearly as addictive as whiskey to me. And thank the heavens for that! I can't think of one single thing that has aided my biological healing more. Embracing sobriety is completely different when you're properly nourished.

2. Waking up in the morning (EARLY IN THE MORNING) to do yoga and be on time for work. It may not seem like a lot to you, but this was ruining my life. I was late every single morning since drying out. Starting your day like that makes being sober suck. Thanks to constant prayer, a loving boyfriend, and a cleverly placed alarm clock I now wake up at 5 in the morning like a normal person.

3. Morning Yoga! Yes! Yes! Yes! It is changing my life. I had to establish a moderate and consistent practice and I knew it. For me this meant committing to at least 30 minutes a day of asana. My tendency is to ignore my practice for weeks on end and then spend four days attempting to fast while doing yoga for 73 hours straight. Not fun! I want a loving yoga practice and that is what I'm uncovering with the help of my new found friends Routine and Discipline.

4. I'm doing my steps! I've started on the Step One reading and almost of all The Doctor's Opinion is highlighted green with my identification. I'm working through Bill's story now, and GSBF (my step sponsor) and I will start working that shit. Yes. Thank you Jesus (it's ironic when I say it, when my little sister says it she's completely earnest)! I'm scared but I know I need this. I am so on my Pink Cloud right now and I will do everything in my power to make it through this inexplicable joy w/o relapsing.

5. I am telling the bf the truth and nothing but when it comes to my aversions, fears, and feelings. Most recently this became necessary when I had to admit that I was risking my colon health to avoid going #2 in his bathroom. Please don't ask me why, I know I'm a headcase. This is where I'm still most likely to backtrack. For obvious reasons.

So there's still a lot more work to be done. I still isolate when I feel wounded. I still avoid scary life responsibilities. Right now I am diligently avoiding my divorce attorney's calls because I owe him money. However my final divorce trial date has been set, so it's probably in my best interests to speak with him. And yet. A frightening glimpse into the workings of an alcoholic mind, no?

Te amo mucho,
Ingenue

And what if I had picked up over that?

2008-01-10T12:11:00.001-05:00

So, I decided to reach out and try to connect my words with other alcoholics today. I've been so touched by all of the honesty that's been gifted to me by other AA's that I wanted to step outside my comfort zone and join in. Here was my leap into the abyss:

Sober Girl to BuddyT show details 9:37 AM (2 hours ago)

Thank you for an informative and amazing site!

Would you consider listing my personal blog? It's my story of spiritual recovery and I'd love to have it be accessible to anyone sick and suffering. My address is:http://ingenueinterrupted.blogspot.com/ Thank you so much! Ingenue

Here was the reply I received:

BuddyT to me show details 9:59 AM (2 hours ago)

Hi,
Okay, I went to your blog. I read "My sibling can suck it." I'm afraid I did not see any "spiritual recovery" there I would care to pass on to myvisitors.
BuddyT About.com Guide to Alcoholism http://alcoholism.about.com

Hmmm. OK. Well I admittedly haven't been sober for long, so I may be mistaken here. I thought I heard about 300 people tell me it's really important to get in touch with your feelings, no matter how brutal they are, but I could be wrong. I could have sworn someone mentioned something about journaling anonymously to try and put the pieces together in a safe place where other involved parties are not likely to be hurt. Maybe it was just brain fog from early sobriety tho.

No I'm sure Buddy is right. It's much better for us to judge each other and make sure that all newbies know that some feelings are not right NO MATTER WHAT. You can't drink over it, but bottle it up inside and see if you can't find some new method of self-destruction to unleash on yourself. Far better than admitting that a non-alcoholic sister is hurting your feelings with her uninformed ideas about your sobriety. Sheesh! So I responded:

Sober Girl to BuddyT show details 11:39 AM (52 minutes ago)

I'm sorry you feel that way. While that was simply a post of catharis there are more where I talk about the simple every day grace of being granted another sober day. My writing voice is admittedly young, but certainly not singular. I've read through plenty of the blogs you listed and there aren't only pretty sentiments expressed. The point of my blog is to show simply and honestly the good, the bad, and the ugly of recovering your spirit. I'm surprised to receive this level of judgement from a fellow alcoholic. Which program are you working again? I have 76 day sober today, I'm still counting days, why on earth would you think that I wouldn't have difficult emotions to express? I really expected more from someone who seems to be concerned with helping Alcoholics stay sober. Guess just not this alcoholic, huh?

I was upset at first, but now I find myself undeterred. It's all a lesson one way or another and this one really hits home. A fine, shining example of everything I do not want to be in my recovery. I'm going to go meditate on some of my lingering resentments now, that dude's lack of open-mindedness really put the fear of god in me. Or the fear of ignorance. Whichever comes first....

I.I.

I needed that.

2008-01-08T09:42:00.000-05:00

"Put it down."

"No."

"Put it down Ingenue."

"No."

"Put it down and engage! You're isolating and you know it!"

I did in fact know that I was isolating, but I could hardly be bothered seeing as I had just gotten my ipod back that morning. I hadn't played a game of ipod solitaire in weeks and past that? I really didn't feel like bonding with other drunks at that moment. Sorry.

The person pointing out my lack of engagement was my Gay Sober Best Friend (known hereafter as GSBF) and he had a valid point although I wasn't ready to acknowledge it. There were plenty of good reasons not to be in an AA meeting right then and I was trying not to stand up and walk out. If ipod solitaire helps me win that battle then let me stack my aces bro. For starters it was 55 degrees in the middle of January. It was so beautiful! People were wandering around wearing nothing but their spring hoodies and unreasonably happy smiles. I had a fully charged ipod loaded up with newly downloaded music and it seemed only right that I be one of the happy souls wandering NYC as well. But no. I am an Alcoholic which means I have to attend AA meetings to discuss the fact that I am an Alcoholic if I want to keep my sexy self sober. No fresh air for me, no sir.

Also, the meetings of late have been dull, dull affairs. No matter how much I try to be still, listen, and learn I find my mind resenting the reality of recovery. (Check out my illiteration today!) Alcoholics tend to have very similar life stories. In the beginning this fact makes it really easy to identify with other Alcoholics thereby recognizing your own disease. Now that I've gotten my little piece of sobriety though, it's getting repetitive. So on this fine, breezy evening I just gave up trying to pretend like I was anything other than bored with A.A. And wouldn't you know it? It worked.

The second the speaker walked up to the podium I knew she was the real deal. Her easy urban/surfer swagger caught my full attention. Bye, bye distraction. Hello presence! Her story was the same as everyone else's but it was so hers that I couldn't help being completely engrossed. With honesty, humour, and depth she revealed which Alchoholic camp she fell into. See, recovering drunks can really only be divided into two categories. Those Who Relapse and Those Who (blessedly)Don't. She had lived through her share of relapses and was fervently praying to be spared any more. Most of us are relapsers because this is a disease defined by relapse. That's what alcohol addiction is. It's picking up a drink even though you know it might kill you. It's an unnatural compulsion to destroy yourself, literally obliterate your being. She knew this all too well. As she shared about how much relapsing took from her a giant cosmic lightbulb fired off exactly two inches above my head.

This is my first time in the rooms, as they say. This is my first stab at recovery so I've not yet experienced the heartache of relapse. Listening to her, I realized that I was slipping into a smugness in my sobriety. I've been doing so well lately that I've been letting myself forget that I am an Alcoholic and relapse is part of the package for me. De-prioritizing my recovery leaves me wide open for disaster. I don't have to force a spiritual epiphany in every meeting, but I do have to show up so the epiphanies can find me.

GSBF and I left at the break to scope another meeting (a meeting which I love btw. They always have coffee and snacks and everyone is happy, mostly gay, and very well dressed) and I took off w/o thanking her. So I'm doing it now. Cheers chica. You made me laugh and opened my heart and mind so I could learn a little bit more about myself. You kept me sober for one more day and it means the world to me. Congrats on your one year back and here's to 15 more.

xoxo I.I.

Rest, read, write. Repeat.

2008-01-07T15:22:00.000-05:00

I haven't had my ipod on since Dec. 23. I was on vacation without access to my laptop and it ran out of juice. I let it chill until New Year's eve when I took it to A's house to charge it back to life. In true Ingenue fashion I left my lover's house that night sans ipod and got down to the business at hand. That business being learning how to entertain myself on subway rides w/o my commuting playlist. Hindsight being 20/20 I think this was really the best medicine I could have found myself. The last two weeks have been devoted to reading, writing and I'd love to say 'rythmetic, but I've never been down with the numbers game.

It's amazing how much of my life is whittled away by the constant need to entertain myself. A remarked on it the other day while I was absentmindedly checking my email, watching Factory Girl, reading the latest tome of an amazing woman, and eating soba noodles while wondering out loud if it might be nice to get a pizza. This is me smack dab in the middle of my monkey mind realm and what I love best about A is that he spots it. And points it out. And ridicules me for my insanity.

For instance: I like to watch the same movies again and again and again. I don't necessarily watch them per se, I just like to have them on in the background because I find it tremendously comforting. And in this crazy world don't we need all the comfort we can get? A, on the other hand, considers this nothing short of a cinematic travesty. In His world, if a filmmaker put all of his blood, sweat, and tears into a film for better or worse he/she deserves a viewer's undivided attention. If there's an important movie he wants to watch with me he refuses to press play until I have dropped my book or whatever else I'm doing. He doesn't even watch movies he really likes more than three times and that to me is just plain batshit. My god, I've watched Rent 43 times and I didn't even like that movie.

What's strange is this. Lately, I only act like that at His house. You would think that I would reserve this kind of tail chasing for the privacy of my own home. Not so! When I'm at my house I flow pretty peacefully between reading, yoga, eating, maybe some tv, a nice bath, ahhhh sleep. It is totally not an issue. I also spend a fair amount of time avoiding my dishes, but that's a blog for another time. No, it's only at His house where I scurry around trying to fill every moment with at least 4 mutually exclusive activities. Why would that be?

The easy answer here is that my boyfriend scares me. Not in the scary, abusive, misogynist sort of way, not at all! A is the opposite of all that is skeevy. But I really don't know how to sit quietly in the presence of such love and just enjoy it. It pretty much freaks me out. And when I get freaked out I act like a two year old and demand my favorite movies, and sugary treats to dope me up. When I'm freaked I can't be still, it feels much more reasonable to be darting between a few objectives. Moving targets and all that. But A sees all and A mentions all. Because of this award-winning character trait of his, I am getting a much clearer picture of myself. It's like Me through the eyes of the Man Burdened with the Task of Loving Me. And my ego loves taking something that's actually quite simple and making it as complex as is egoically possible.

So this is actually quite good for me. It's good to have these mental blocks popping up so I can review them and see them dissolve under the light of my presence. My favorite moments in life are the ones where my mind stays pretty much out of it and the experience overwhelms the need for analysis. It's good to remember. Is a life without silence a life worth living? Is a love without stillness a love worth loving? Well obviously, yes, all love is worth it, but you get my drift. I'm just saying.

xoxo Ingenue

I knew it, but I won't say I told you so.

2008-01-04T15:28:00.000-05:00

Who likes astrology? I do! I do! I like astrology so much that I pretty much schedule my life around it's calls. No, I don't stay at home in bed if the NY Post horoscope tells me doom is a'coming. I'm far more progressive than that. I read 4 or 5 different horoscopes for the day, pick out the one I like best, and then devotedly adhere to it's wisdom.

Seriously, I think astrology offers a lot of wisdom. I've been drawn to the idea of divine, cosmic patterns since I can remember. I was raised by a young mother who had a bit of a Cosmopolitan fetish. Our favorite time of year was when the January issue came out with the requisite Bedside Astrologer. Oh the joy! It told me the colors I should wear for the year to insure romantic success. As an uncertain yet precocious eight year old I found this information to be crucial. I had a much harder time decoding what the all-knowing B.A. meant by, "You will find new ways to stimulate you lover between the sheets. Meow!" I mean, hey, I was eight. I planned quite a few misguided sleep-overs because of copy like that.

But I digress. The point is my love of astrology grew with me over the years. It deepened and matured and now I'm pretty much an unofficial expert.

Which is why I was as surprised as anybody to realize that I was smack-dab in the midst of my Saturn Return and I didn't even realize it. The Saturn Return is not something that you see in your average daily, weekly, or monthly horoscopes. Your Saturn Return happens every 29 1/2 years when Saturn returns to the sign it was in when you were born. Saturn Returns are notoriously brutal. People lose jobs, homes, and leave relationships. If you are not living authentically Saturn will do his damndest to force you into a more honest path for your 3rd decade of life. It is everyone's coming of age and it starts when your 28 and ends when your 30 and some change. Sound familiar? No one can escape it and resistance is futile.

Figuring out where Saturn is in your birth chart is pretty much decoding your life's purpose, crusades, and obstacles. Now don't freak out on me, there's some wiggle room and of course you are an individual and all that shit. But there is an underlying astrological flavor to anyone's mission and here's mine:

Saturn in Virgo Issues and Traits:

perfectionism
mental and physical health
preventive and alternative healthcare
mind body connection
service
whose slave are you? and it's correlate, you are only as good as the master you serve
digestive disorders, anorexia, bulimia, diarrhea, Chron's disease
soul mates
chaos and order
compulsive disorders
psychosomatic illness
nerves and hyper sensitivity
refined intellect
ability to focus
seeing the parts and the whole

Oh. My. Holy. Jesus. This perfectly describes, nay, mandates! the chaos that my life has been dissolving into since Fall of last year. To be fair, the alcoholism had been steadily growing worse for years leading up to the break. But the Do or Die, Now or Never, Somebody Save Me or I'm Out energies of September, October, and since perfectly match my Saturn Return.

My entire life essentially boils down to my struggle to eradicate my self-destructive tendencies and addictions. I am an addictive personality to the third power. I feel like I was a born with a tattoo on my heart that said; if some is good then more is better and if you can't have it all, Fuck It. I can become addicted to absolutely anything. And the core of my addiction is always the same. I convince myself that I am deeply broken and flawed and my addiction will make me whole. If I can't be whole by way of my addiction then I won't be able to live at all. And even if I could live without the object of my obsession, what would be the point?

This state of affairs has left me pretty shaken. I have never in my adult life known what it was like to live in a physical/mental state that wasn't chemically altered somehow. Giving up the doozies Alcohol and Drugs is a huge step forward but I feel like I have so much more to do. Lately I have been harrassed by constant fantasies of a perfect raw vegan diet, a disciplined and devoted Yoga practice, and a clean and purified home (metaphor for my body, my temple. Get it?). Basically a life of commitment, contentment, peace, and purity. Cleansed. Sweet smelling.

This couldn't be further from my current mode of operation. I'm one foot in, one foot out and its driving me out of my shit. I no longer drink or drug, but I smoke like a chimney and my caffiene consumption borders on psychotic. I prefer Raw Foods above all else but seem to be completely incapable of getting myself into the routine of: a. cleaning my kitchen (nuclear levels of filth there) and b. buying my groceries in a regular of enough fashion to keep myself in produce. I mean, I'm getting there, and if I just snapped my fingers and made it happen overnight it would hardly feel like lasting growth, would it? This is 13 years of habitual destruction I'm transforming. It's going to take a minute.

Overall, I'm just pleased as punch that I'm finally getting on with it, you know? I feel ready to answer this call. While the process isn't always pleasant, it's liberating. The dead weight is being released. I am coming ever closer to serving this world with grace instead of draining it with my constant tragedies. Whatever that costs me, I'll gladly pay. Totally worth it.

I.I.

Be the change, baby.

2008-01-04T09:53:00.000-05:00

I can't believe I have 69 days sober. How phallic is that? It strikes me as somehow symbolic although I can't quite make the connection yet. Truth be told I have never, EVER, appreciated the idea of 69. BJ's on their own are just fine by me but warping it into some sort of human gymnastic contraption that requires me to hold my ass in my lover's face while my poor head bobs up and down on his thrusting manly bits, well, I'll pass. I have a pretty profound aversion to receiving oral as well. Much to my boyfriend's confusion I find I would rather give than receive. When I first explained this to A, he pretty much lost his mind.

"I've never heard of that before!"

"Never heard of what?"

"I've never heard of a girl who didn't want a man to eat her out. Are you honestly telling me you would rather suck me off than lay there and be pleasured?"

I know it's strange but there I am. That's me. I am a girl who has no qualms about letting her man fearlessly explore her anal cavity with his penis yet unravels into a mass of quivering insecurity at the thought of tongue in vagina activity. Hmmmm.

Except that maybe it's not me anymore. It's very hard to tell these days and I blame the 69 days sober. Black is white and night is day right now. Going through the terrifying process of standing up to my alcoholism and living without a constant blurrying drunk is revealing some pretty interesting tidbits about myself. It seems that some form of transformation is underfoot, the first stage of which is undeniably self-discovery.

The trickiest facet of this whole Getting to Know Thyself endeavor is admitting I don't know what I don't know. Embracing the mystery and such. It's not easy to admit to myself that after 28 years on this madcap planet I haven't retained enough insight into my inner workings to decifer whether or not cunnilingus is my cup of tea. But it's all muddied in there and I don't want the baby going out with the bathwater. The part of my mind that holds my past drunken memories is a horrifying place and I only go there when I'm armed to the teeth with compassion, radical acceptance, and chocolate. It may not seem like much to the casual observer but those Fears that bullied me into drinking myself to death are nasty motherfuckers. They like scaring me and they laugh at me when I cry. They promise that they'll leave me be if I share a bottle of Jameson with them. But I know their wicked ways now. I know when my Fears are lying to me and I do not bend or break to their calls for booze.

Like I said, I have something new going on inside me and I want to aid and abet the revolution. I want to embrace the transformation instead of escaping from it. I want to collect real-deal, sober experiences and then decide what I like and what I don't like. I'd really like to break up with my Fears and see what's on the other side but I'm getting the idea that this is not something you can force or rush. And that's fine. I have new sobriety, a new spiritual awakening, new responsibilities, new love, and a new life pretty much. I think I need to be with all of that for a little bit before I try and do anything else.

So this blog really is for my edification. This is my enlightenment and I want this shit chronicled so I can look back and say with pride, "There it is. There is the year that Life as I Knew It transformed into Life as I Know It Now."

And 69 days sober is as good a time as any to start the documenting.

xoxoxo Ingenue